


Hereafter

by laireshi



Category: Avengers (Comics), Marvel 616
Genre: Angst, Getting Together, Happy Ending, Identity Porn, M/M, Mindwiping, Present Day Romance, Secret Identity, Vampire Tony Stark, Vampires, Wartime Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-03
Updated: 2018-11-03
Packaged: 2019-08-17 04:47:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 28,634
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16509650
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/laireshi/pseuds/laireshi
Summary: Steve Rogers and Anthony Stark, better known as Captain America and Iron Man, get into a whirlwind romance during World War II. When Steve crashes his plane and wakes up in the 21st century, he thinks his whole world is gone. The Avengers become his family, though, and Iron Man is still a hero. Of course, after so many years, there's another man piloting the suit. Steve's lost Anthony forever.Steve doesn't know the new Iron Man's identity, but he becomes good friends with him all the same. And then Iron Man is forced to reveal himself, and Steve learns the truth: that it's still Anthony, not aged a day, and perhaps more importantly, that Anthony is a vampire.





	Hereafter

**Author's Note:**

> This is my fic for the 2018 Cap-Iron Man Big Bang challenge. Thanks for running it, mods! I wanted to write this fic for years, and finally, it is done. 
> 
> I was paired with two awesome artists! 
> 
> The art by [MassiveSpaceWren](http://massivespacewren.tumblr.com/) is embedded in the fic and you can also see it [in her AO3 post](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16509680).
> 
> The art by [faite](http://hellogarbagetime.tumblr.com/) is [here on AO3](http://www.archiveofourown.org/works/16499645) or [here on tumblr](http://hellogarbagetime.tumblr.com/post/179729414634/hereafter-by-laireshi-steve-rogers-and-anthony).
> 
> Thank you both for the great experience!
> 
> I can't thank my beta, [runningondreams](https://archiveofourown.org/users/runningondreams/pseuds/runningondreams), enough. She's amazing and patient and a great brainstorming partner. There's a dancing scene in this fic and she basically rewrote it because she's THE BEST.
> 
> This is a vampire fic: expect some blood. Also a minor villain death occurs.

_Now_ :

Iron Man is something Steve remembers. Something safe, something from his past life, _real life_. He's not sure what he's doing here, in a new century, but Iron Man . . . Iron Man is a constant. Steve has to ask.

“There hasn’t been another Captain America. How come there’s another Iron Man?”

“You could read it in a newspaper,” Iron Man says, sounding amused.

“I'm asking you,” Steve says. Newspapers aren't the most reliable source of information. He knows that much. “I met Iron Man during the war. The armour was beautiful, but so _different_ to yours.”

It had been much bigger than Iron Man’s current armour and probably made from different materials. The technological jump between the forties and the twenty-first century has been _huge_. The Iron Man armour’s not much larger than a normal human, now, when it used to be too big to fit in most corridors. The armour Steve remembers was dark in colour, brown and black, suited to flying clandestine missions in the night sky. 

Watching the new armour in motion is almost better than watching the old one had been. Steve feels a bit like it’s a betrayal, but the new suit is red and gold and he loves how vibrant and shiny it is, how Iron Man is a hero out in the open, nothing stealthy about him, because he doesn’t have to hide on secret missions anymore. The armour captures attention and holds it. It’s dangerous, too, and the colours serve to warn anyone considering fighting it, much like poisonous frogs with bright skin. It’s much faster than it used to be. Somehow, it’s simultaneously more and less human. The tech used to make it might as well be magic for Steve. He thinks Anthony would have loved it, seeing just how far and how fast the tech has progressed. 

He realises he’s fallen deep into his own thoughts and he shakes his head to clear it. 

Iron Man seems to be watching him for a moment, as if trying to guess what Steve’s thinking about, before he shrugs easily. “Hopefully you like the new design more,” he says, but Steve knows he's joking. “Mister Stark's ancestor built that armour. He was the one wearing the suit, too. His son improved it, as did Mister Stark after him.”

“But it's no longer him in the armour,” Steve says. He looks at Iron Man, for a moment considering this crazy, insane, wonderful idea. “Are you—”

Iron Man laughs. It sounds strange through the helmet filters, but Steve is sure he recognises the sound correctly. “Mister Stark’s family is long dead, Captain, and I wouldn't be wearing it if I were a millionaire. I'm his bodyguard. In theory. Mister Stark is rather reclusive. He doesn’t need me much.”

Steve nods, fighting disappointment.

What did he expect, really? That somehow it would be the same person under the armour? Someone who could understand what Steve lost; more than that, someone who could give him part of his life back? _Anthony_? Steve had survived the ice, so maybe, maybe—he couldn’t let himself go down that road. He was only alive thanks to good luck (or was it bad, he wonders sometimes): the serum kept him alive in the ice like a form of cryogenic stasis. Anthony, brilliant as he might’ve been, was just a normal human.

“They kept the name,” Iron Man continues. “There’s always something new to be fought, another villain waiting around the corner. I guess they all liked the idea of a legacy.”

It makes sense, Steve thinks. Anthony would’ve liked it. He would’ve liked this century, too, all the new inventions and scientific advancements. For all Steve knows, Anthony might’ve even been behind some of them. He hasn’t asked and he hasn’t checked himself. He doesn’t feel ready to learn what happened to him, not yet.

Steve's only had a glimpse of this new world. No flying cars yet, but you can now video call someone across the Earth with a device that fits in your pocket. You can send messages to friends and family anywhere instead of worrying if they’ll come home. There are cures to so many illnesses. There is more freedom, to move around the world and to be who you are. Steve thinks he might like it here, in time.

He still misses _home_.

“Hey,” Iron Man sounds contemplative. Steve wonders how he manages to show so many emotions even though he’s speaking through a voice filter. “I think Mister Stark has the original armour hidden somewhere, if you want to take a look.”

Steve’s aware that he should be happy at the prospect, but he still feels so lost. The armour probably is in some attic, covered in dust like the relic of the past that it is, these days. Just where Steve should be, treacherous thoughts inside his head whisper. He does his best to ignore them. 

“That would be great,” he forces out, though his throat is tight. “Thank you.”

Iron Man takes another longer moment before finally nodding. 

***

 _Then_ :

Steve froze the moment he noticed Iron Man _wasn’t_ , technically, Iron Man at the moment: the armour was open and a tall, lean man was standing next to it, his back to Steve. He probably hadn’t heard Steve approaching—and Steve was still unused to it, just how quietly he could move these days. The Iron Man pilot’s identity was supposed to be a secret though, and so Steve pivoted on one foot.

“It’s okay, Captain,” the man called without turning back. “You _can_ keep a secret, can’t you?” 

So he had heard Steve.

“I didn’t mean to intrude,” Steve said.

“Nonsense.” He faced Steve. “My name’s Anthony.”

He was shockingly pale in the dimly lit hangar, resembling a ghost more than a living person. This, coupled with how slender he was, almost made him seem sick. Surprising, considering Steve knew operating the Iron Man armour took considerable strength. Still, he knew better than to judge the man by appearances alone. His clothes seemed out of place: a dark blue tailcoat worn over a black waistcoat. Steve wasn’t an expert, but even he could see it was high quality tailoring.

“Anthony,” he repeated, tasting the name on his tongue. 

“Anthony Stark,” came the clarification, and the man smiled, just for a second. 

He had already proven himself to be a trustworthy ally, and not just on paper, so Steve decided to return the courtesy. “Steve Rogers,” he said, pulling off his cowl.

“I know,” Anthony said, and before Steve could ask—his identity was supposed to be a secret, too—he waved his hand as if the matter was inconsequential, and said, “I lent a hand in Project Rebirth.”

“Seems I have more to thank you for than getting me out of the bomb radius yesterday,” Steve said, trying to cover how unnerved he felt by the admission. He’d thought Captain America and Iron Man were on equal footing. 

Then again, Anthony _had_ just decided to reveal his identity to him.

Steve walked closer, so they could speak without raising their voices across the hangar. As he did so, he noticed Anthony’s eyes, bright blue even in the shadows, pulling Steve in almost against his will, even as he could feel a warning in the back of his mind . . . Anthony blinked, slowly.

Steve looked away. He obviously needed more sleep. “So,” he said, “an engineer, a fighter, and a scientist?” 

“These are difficult times, Captain,” Anthony answered. “We all try to do the best we can.”

Steve had lied in his enlist forms and needed a scientific miracle to be able to help in any way—and apparently it was thanks to this man too that the serum had succeeded. It was curious, though, that a scientist was allowed to fight and risk his life in the field, if he could do so much outside of it.

He said as much, and Anthony chuckled. “They couldn’t stop me if they tried,” he said. “And there are things that are too important for me to sit out on the sidelines, hoping they’ll come to an end on their own.”

“That’s why I wanted to fight,” Steve admitted. “It’s just . . . not right.” And he still felt like he should’ve been doing more.

Some of this must’ve shown in his face, because Anthony said gently, “You give people hope, Captain. That’s more important than you can imagine.”

“Hope won’t stop bullets.”

“No,” Anthony agreed. “But without it, we might as well lie down and wait for the one meant for us.”

Harsh words, but true. Steve relaxed minutely. He wasn’t sure why he felt so _off_. He _knew_ what he was doing, what they were all doing here, helped. He believed they would manage to end this war. And yet, just now, the despair—that wasn’t like him. It had felt like he was teetering on the edge, something dangerous lurking in the dark around him . . . But there was light in the hangar, if not very bright, and there was only Anthony next to him. It was safe.

Steve really needed sleep. 

“What brought you here in the first place?” Anthony asked suddenly. “I’m not complaining, of course, but I wasn’t expecting you.”

Steve winced. “I’m sorry.”

“I don’t mind,” Anthony informed him. “This whole _classified_ business leaves me with no one to talk to.” He tilts his head, something dark flashing across his face almost too fast to notice. “For a good reason, mind you, but still.”

Steve nodded. It made sense. He could talk to people in his uniform, even if he was unused to the respect the other soldiers gave him just because he was _Captain America_. The Iron Man armour, though, would make it hard to communicate with others—not to mention that it was bulky and fared better outside than inside. And a man such as Anthony _would_ attract attention and questions.

“I came here to say thanks,” Steve replied finally.

Anthony rolled his eyes. “You’ve already done that, and it goes without saying, anyway. We’re together in this.”

“That, and . . .” Steve trailed off, unsure how to put it into words. It hadn’t been their first mission together and it hadn’t been the first time Iron Man had grabbed Steve and _flown into the air_ , but the experience still seemed straight out of a science-fiction book: a man flying as if he had wings, free, not closed in a multi-passenger metal box like a plane or a helicopter. Steve doubted he’d ever get used to it. And yesterday had been special: it _was_ the first time they’d done it in the daylight. “How do you ever set down?” he asked finally. 

“I still have to charge that thing,” Anthony told him drily, but his eyes were amused. “I like the freedom of flight too.”

“It’s always amazing,” Steve told him fervently, “But yesterday I could _see_ where we were, and . . .”

“Oh,” Anthony muttered, pushing his hair out of his eyes with the back of his hand. “I didn’t consider that. I see just fine in the dark—in the armour, I mean. I don’t usually go out in daylight. Too much of a target.”

There was something in the way he looked at the windows, then, a kind of longing mixed with fear. Steve frowned, unsure how to interpret that. 

“Still,” Anthony said lightly, his face smoothing again. “It was certainly worth the risk, if it meant keeping you safe.”

Steve raised his eyebrow, a bit surprised, but not _opposed_. “I’m flattered,” he replied in the same tone of voice, and they grinned at each other.

***

 _Now_ :

Steve wakes up and for a moment he's not sure where he is. He thinks it should be colder—

But no. He's in the Mansion, in the twenty-first century, and he's— _home_ , he thinks. It's home. (It’s really not, though, because _home_ is gone, but he knows this is all he has. So it will be home, in time, because he doesn’t have a choice.)

He gets up, steps to the temperature control panel. It’s still set high, to 80 degrees, and only seeing it actually convinces him he’s not freezing. In the beginning he was worried about raking up the electrical bill, but Jarvis told him it was not an issue.

Mister Stark is very rich, but that alone doesn’t explain why he opened his door to a man he doesn’t know, hasn’t even seen. Steve is grateful—but he’d like to thank him, personally, one day. See the grandson of a man who—no, Steve’s not going there. Not thinking about the questions he wants to ask. There are some losses he’s not yet ready to consider.

He puts on soft shoes and goes to the kitchen. He drinks a glass of water and immediately fills another. Watching the water run has always calmed him down. He takes the second glass back to his bedroom. He’s still tired, but he hasn’t been sleeping well lately; he’s worried he’ll just keep waiting up until the sunrise.

The Mansion is dark and quiet, everyone but him sound asleep. As he's going up the stairs, he feels wind on his face, but—air-conditioning, he realises, and feels silly. He’s not yet used to it.

He thinks someone is watching him, but that's unlikely: only the Avengers are in the Mansion, and all of them would just greet him. Still . . . Steve turns around sharply and thinks he sees a dark figure standing at the end of the hall, just for a second, less than that.

He rubs his eyes. He's more tired than he thought if he’s seeing things.

The eerie sensation of being watched doesn't quite recede until he closes his door behind him.

He leans back against the door, breathing too fast, as if he just avoided some grave danger. He would laugh at himself if his heart wasn’t beating quite so quickly.

He drinks half of the cup of water and sets it on his bedside table. He’s completely out of it. His breathing is still too fast, and he thinks he should go out, make sure everyone in the building is safe—Steve is not a coward, after all, especially when he has to protect his friends. But he’s exhausted and he’s seeing things, and in his current state, he might just clock Jarvis with the shield, and that would be unacceptable.

He should sleep. 

He’s out before his head even touches the pillow. 

He wakes up feeling completely rested. He thinks something happened last night—but no, he only went to grab a glass of water, and then slept soundly until 9 AM. Later than usual, but he definitely needed the rest.

He gets up and feels full of energy for the first time in ages. It’s sunny outside, and Steve immediately feels even better. 

He pulls out his jogging clothes—courtesy of Mister Stark, yet again—and finally steps out of the Mansion.

The run is nice; he finally has energy that he wants to spend. He goes around the Mansion a few times before running down the street. It’s late for a morning jog, so he’s the only one there, and he breathes fully and enjoys the sun. 

He can do that, now. The war is over. 

***

He comes back to the Mansion in a great mood and heads straight into the kitchen. Jan and Iron Man are there: Jan finishing an apple, Iron Man, amusingly, drinking tomato juice through a straw put in the armour’s mouthpiece. They’re are talking quietly. They both turn when they hear Steve.

“Oh, Steve!” Jan smiles when he walks into the kitchen. “Feeling good?”

“Yeah.” Steve smiles back, he can’t stop himself. The difference one night of good sleep can make.

“Did you sleep well?” Iron Man asks, like he’s reading his mind. “You seemed tired lately.”

Steve ducks his head. He’d hoped no one had noticed. The last thing he wants is to be a bother, or worse, for others to pity him. So he’s lost decades of his life, so what. He’s _dealing_ with it. He is. “I’m okay.”

“I’m glad,” Iron Man says and then explains, “I saw you reading in the library many nights—I was starting to get worried.” 

Steve looks down. “You can always come in,” he suggests. “I like reading, but—I’d like to talk to you more, you know.”

“Books are always better when you can share them with a friend,” Iron Man agrees. “I didn’t want to intrude on you, but I’ll be sure to remember that.”

“Steve, if you need anything, let me know,” Jan chimes in with a friendly wave. “There’s a new exhibition in MoMA next week, I’ve an invitation to the opening party.”

“That’d be great.” Steve loves art—as she well knows; Jan _has_ caught him sketching in the garden, after all. 

“And now I have to rush,” she says, setting the apple core down on her plate. “I’ve a meeting with the fabrics importer.”

“Good luck,” Iron Man says.

“The importer will certainly need it if he didn’t get what I asked for,” Jan jokes, and then she’s out of the roo.

“Hey, Iron Man,” Steve says slowly. “I really didn’t want to scare you away from the library. It’s your home more than mine.”

“Nonsense,” Iron Man tells him, his tone not inviting discussion.

“What were you doing up that late, anyway?” Steve asks. “Can’t you sleep too?”

Iron Man tilts his head, as if he’s amused. “I always stay up late,” he says.

So had Anthony, Steve remembers, his chest hurting.

“I missed out on a lot of new literature, too,” Steve says. “You can show me what you like.”

“You got it, Captain,” Iron Man says after a moment. 

“Thanks,” Steve says. He thinks talking to someone, about anything, is what he might miss most of all. Hank’s usually in his lab, and Jan is a great friend, yes, but . . . It’s the easiest with Iron Man, who’s so familiar in a way he shouldn’t be. It’s not the same man inside. It’s not even the same armour.

But maybe there is something in the name, after all, like in the legends of old.

“You’ll find there’s a lot of movie adaptations, too,” Iron Man says, turning back and looking for something in the kitchen cabinet. “Though the quality is questionable sometimes.”

He sets a jar of jam and another of peanut butter in front of Steve and then passes him bread, too.

“Breakfast is the most important meal of the day,” he says in the exaggerated tone of a health instructor.

“Have _you_ eaten, then?” Steve asks as he starts to make himself a sandwich.

Iron Man points at his now empty glass.

“I’m not sure that counts,” Steve tells him.

“Don’t worry, I keep a very healthy diet.”

Steve can’t help but laugh. Maybe the future isn’t so bad. Maybe he can find a family here, too.

***

 _Then_ :

Steve balanced the tray in one hand as he pushed the doorknob with the other. The awareness of his own body came easily to him in a fight—thankfully—and it was the mundane actions that left him surprised, like right now: there was a cup of coffee on the tray. The liquid didn’t so much as move in the cup as Steve walked. He looked around the hangar. It was more cluttered than the last time Steve had been there and he didn’t immediately see Anthony, his view of the other wall obscured by piles of wooden crates.

“Good afternoon,” he called. “Iron Man?”

“Over here!” Anthony’s voice, not distorted through the armour’s speakers. It came from the back, so Steve headed in that direction. The hangar was constantly badly-lit, it seemed, and all the new crates didn’t help, but at least it wasn’t dark enough to really worry about walking into anything.

He found Anthony sitting at a writing desk. He was playing with a pen, tossing it between his fingers. An open notebook full of equations was on the desk, but Anthony wasn’t looking at it. He stood up as Steve emerged from behind the crates.

“Hello there,” he said. He frowned, and then he moved his notebook aside, gesturing at Steve to put the tray down. “The canteen was too crowded?”

“Uh.” Steve hesitated. Maybe it’d been a stupid idea. “Actually, I brought you lunch. And some coffee. I know you stay up late.”

Anthony looked vaguely uncomfortable for a second. He rubbed his left eye. “I’m not really hungry.” 

Steve eyed the food. It was supposed to be a meat stew with some carrots, but mostly had a sad brown colour. Sure, it wasn’t a meal from a posh restaurant, but it wasn’t all bad. And they needed to preserve their strength.

“No, really,” Anthony said. “I had a big breakfast.” He chuckled. “You should have it. I know what the serum did to your metabolism.”

“Sorry.” Steve shifted his weight awkwardly. “I didn’t want to bother you,” he blurted out.

“Hey.” Anthony looked at him. Steve had to look back: it felt like he didn’t have a choice. “I appreciate it, and you’re more than welcome to eat here any time, but I’m fine. Really.” He gestured at the seat he’d vacated. “Go on.”

His eyes burning, Steve sat down. This was not what he’d planned at all. “Drink the coffee at least,” he said.

Anthony pulled himself another chair nearby and smiled, but didn’t reply. He pointed at the tray again. “I spy something resembling a vegetable. Fascinating. Come on, Captain, it’s supposed to be healthy for you.”

“That’s why I brought it for _you_ ,” Steve shot back.

“Your concern is touching,” Anthony drawled. He crossed his arms in front of himself and seemed content to sit there and watch Steve eat, so, feeling terribly self-conscious, Steve did. It was true that he needed more sustenance these days to be really full, but he could also go longer than a baseline human without any nutrition. He definitely didn’t want the food to go to waste though, so he ate the admittedly rather tasteless stew.

Anthony didn’t touch the coffee. Instead, he kept staring at Steve with complete focus. There was a weird look on his face, not unlike hunger.

Steve frowned. “You sure you don’t want any?”

Anthony startled. “I’m not hungry,” he repeated, and it sounded like a lie. He stood up suddenly. “I need to do something.”

He disappeared behind a crate without another word, and a moment later Steve heard a door opening and closing again. 

Steve moved his spoon in the stew dejectedly. He should’ve asked first. He’d thought it would be nice, but Anthony was a grown man, for god’s sake: he could feed himself. All Steve wanted to do was to disappear and maybe wipe the last fifteen minutes from everyone’s history, but he forced himself to finish eating and stay where he was. Anthony didn’t seem like the kind of a person who had issues telling someone to get out. He’d said he’d be back, and Steve didn’t want to make the situation even more awkward by running away.

He stood up and stretched his arms. 

“That’s a nice picture,” Anthony said, and Steve almost jumped. Anthony came back from a different direction than he’d disappeared from; Steve hadn’t heard him approaching. 

He wasn’t sure how to answer the obvious come on: people didn’t usually compliment him, and definitely not people as attractive as Anthony was.

“Look who’s talking,” he settled on saying, letting his eyes wander up and down Anthony’s body. If he came back flirting with Steve, he really couldn’t be too upset about the lunch disaster. 

The problem with checking him out was, of course, that he really was ridiculously beautiful. He was wearing an impeccable suit in a deep red colour like wine. Steve longed to run his hands down it. His jacket was unbuttoned, but he had a waistcoat underneath in the same colour. He wouldn’t be out of place at an exclusive party in London. The only thing that didn’t fit in was how tired he looked: there were dark circles underneath his eyes, as if he didn’t sleep well. Steve felt woefully underdressed next to him all the same, in an army t-shirt that was too small for him and khaki pants. He wanted to step in and loosen Anthony’s indubitably silk tie, but he felt like they came from two different worlds and it was only by some odd illusion that they seemed to be in one place.

Steve realised he was staring and forced himself to meet Anthony’s eyes again. The man seemed amused. 

“Come on,” he said. “I was trying to solve a repulsor issue, but I don’t think well in the mornings; talking to you is a much more productive way of spending time.”

Steve raised an eyebrow. “It’s 3 PM,” he said.

“Is it,” Anthony replied mildly.

“What are you doing here?” Steve asked suddenly.

Anthony made a show of looking around. “I believe it’s my workshop, cluttered as it might be at the moment.”

Steve rolled his eyes. “Here. In Europe.”

“Ah,” Anthony said. “I was born in Europe.”

Steve wasn’t really surprised: Anthony’s British accent had told him as much. “At the front,” he clarified.

“I told you, Captain,” Anthony said. “I couldn’t sit back and watch all of this happening. I’m not interested in developing weaponry that would just serve to kill more people in the next great war to come. So I’m doing what I can that hopefully won’t backfire on us all.”

“But you are . . .” Steve wasn’t sure how to phrase the question.

“A rich, handsome genius?” Anthony finished for him. He grinned quickly. “Yes, but I do have a conscience.”

Anthony’s tone was light. Steve would be annoyed, hearing anyone else talk like it was all a joke, but he’d seen Iron Man in action, he’d witnessed his singular focus when it came to fighting and saving lives. Everyone dealt in their own way, and Anthony clearly didn’t particularly enjoy actually talking about the war surrounding them. It wasn’t as if Steve could blame him. 

Maybe they could help each other.

***

 _Now_ :

They’re fighting in the New York City centre, the Avengers trying to take down a bunch of superstrong would-be muggers. It’s easy enough to handle them, with Jan stinging them at each turn and Ant-Man directing his ants to steer the villains away from public property, into the wide open space of the blocked offstreet.

Whoever is piloting the armour—and Steve really doesn’t mind not knowing it; he trusts Iron Man in field and out of it—is good at it, and they’ve clicked together well on the battlefield from the start.

Now, they barely need to speak on the comms. As one of the muggers throws himself at Jan—she’s quick, he doesn’t have a chance anyway—Iron Man aims his repulsors in Steve’s direction, and Steve raises his shield just so to reflect it at the mugger.

The man goes down.

“Thanks, boys,” Jan says in the comms. Then she grows to her normal size. “So, is that all?” she asks the villains surrounded by ants.

They nod, shakily.

Steve smiles at Iron Man, and he has a feeling Iron Man smiles back. “Wait a moment,” he says, and then raises his hand to his cheek. He doesn’t actually need to do it, Steve knows, but it’s his way of indicating he’s calling someone while in the armour—probably the police for clean-up, now. 

He’s silent for a few moments, his external speakers off. Unmoving, he looks like a statue: inhumanly still, literally made from metal. It’s unsettling, to say the least. Steve swallows, feeling tense.

Then Iron Man puts his hand back down and turns to Steve, and the weird apprehension Steve felt disappears immediately. “Care for a ride?” Iron Man asks.

It takes Steve a moment to understand, and then he’s nodding even before he says, “Sure!”

Steve had loved flying with Anthony, but with one notable exception, it had always been at night. He thinks about flying here, in New York: looking at the world, seeing everyone, all the lives they could save—but also just the beautiful views, the clear sky. Steve thinks he could fall in love with it—but that’s just his imagination.

A vision slowly turning to reality though, as Iron Man steps to Steve. His armour is warm to the touch when Iron Man places Steve’s arm around his armoured waist. 

“Can you feel it?” Steve asks.

“Not really,” Iron Man answers, and his voice seems tight.

Steve focuses on getting his footing right, leaning on Iron Man’s boot. He doesn’t doubt that Iron Man would catch him if he fell, but he doesn’t want their first flight together to end with a near-death experience.

Finally, they’re in position. “Ready?” Iron Man asks. He’s definitely grinning under his faceplate.

“Ready,” Steve says, and Iron Man takes them up.

It’s—it’s more than amazing. It’s different to flying with the wartime armour: faster and smoother. It’s more than Steve could’ve ever imagined. There’s wind rushing in his ears, and it’s cool this high up, but it doesn’t remind him of the ice; it’s just right. He knows they’re still far from the clouds—he knows Iron Man wouldn’t fly him that high—but he still feels like he can touch them. Down below, he can barely see people, hundreds and thousands of small figures going about their lives, and all of them special. 

He wants to speak, to tell Iron Man how much he appreciates this, but he can’t form any words. Iron Man pulls him in closer—and then they’re falling down, fast, and he swoops left and right and Steve yells happily. 

“Thank you,” he says when Iron Man finally sets down at the Mansion. “ _Thank you_.”

“You liked it then?” Iron Man asks, as if there was any question of that.

“It was—can we do it again?” Steve says impulsively.

“Any time you want,” Iron Man laughs. 

“Thank you,” Steve repeats once again.

Iron Man reaches a hand in his direction as if to touch Steve, maybe clasp his shoulder, but he drops it almost immediately. He’s silent for a moment, and then he says, “Mister Stark needs me.”

“Sure,” Steve says. “See you later?”

“I wouldn’t forget about our Star Wars plans,” Iron Man replies. “You’re not getting out of this one, mister.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” Steve tells him solemnly. 

He goes to clean up, humming quietly. Some days are bad, but some days are like this: an easy Avengers victory, a new friend so familiar and so different at the same time, and the promise of a nice evening; the sun high up in the sky and everything falling in together.

He’s survived for a reason, and he’s going to make the most of it. Keep fighting evil, because it’s the right thing to do and it’s what he wants and knows how to do—but also take a moment for himself. Anthony had taught him the value of that, of focusing on more than the immediate fight. 

This is why Steve is happy to be in the future— _in the present_ , he corrects himself. This is why he’s looking forward to more. 

***

 _Then_ :

“Why are you even here?!” A raised voice, just short of a yell, rang through the hangar as Steve approached. “You’re better—”

“I can’t recall asking you for an opinion, Ty,” Anthony drawled. 

Steve wondered briefly whether he should turn back, but he had to admit he was curious: who could Anthony be arguing with?

“Am I interrupting?” he asked as he let himself into Anthony’s workshop. Anthony looked at him across the room, his eyes narrowing.

“No, Captain,” he said. He sounded off: he usually said _Captain_ softly, like it was a name and not a title, something special to Steve only. But now it sounded like a simple title.

His companion was a tall, blond man, clad in a dark, perfectly fitted suit; his hand was clasped around Anthony’s wrist possessively. He made no move to remove it at Steve’s entrance, and merely raised an eyebrow. “We weren’t _done_.”

“Tiberius here was just _leaving_ ,” Anthony said with a thin-lipped smile so obviously fake Steve wasn’t sure why he even bothered. He shook his hand free and said something in a language Steve didn’t recognise. Tiberius’ face clouded, clearly disliking whatever was being said, and then Anthony gestured at the door.

“You will regret this, Anthony,” Tiberius said in a low voice.

“I regret many things,” Anthony answered. “Won’t really make a difference.”

“You’ll ask me to come back.”

“Will I?”

They stared at each other until finally Tiberius nodded and walked out the door Anthony had pointed him too—away from Steve.

Anthony stood, his hands curled into fists at his sides.

“Are you okay?” Steve asked.

“Yes,” Anthony answered even though everything about him screamed _no_. “But I am glad you gave me an excuse to throw him out. Thank you.” He left it at that, as if there was nothing more to say on the topic, and Steve let him. They didn’t really know each other well enough for him to insist.

“Good timing,” Steve said.

Anthony sighed. “I’m sorry, but I do need to work on the armour. He messed up my schedule.”

Steve smiled. “No worries. I figured you’d be working, I brought a book.”

Watching Anthony work on the Iron Man armour had become something of a habit. Steve couldn’t begin to comprehend what he was doing, but it was nice and relaxing, just being near him when they weren’t in immediate danger. Steve could just sit down with a book—a rare treat out here—in a terribly uncomfortable chair in the highly secret part of the base that held Anthony’s workshop, and read, occasionally glancing up to see how Anthony was faring. They didn’t talk much, but the silence didn’t bother either of them. It made them less lonely, not more. And Steve definitely could appreciate a moment of silence too, far from the battlefield, away from almost everyone else in the base.

“Well then,” Anthony said, smiling back like he had a secret. “You’re welcome to keep me company.” The invitation in his voice sent Steve’s thoughts flying in a completely different direction, but he told himself to drop it, at least for now, and he followed Anthony to where the armour was stored.

He settled into his chair with its too-straight back and opened his book to the sounds of Anthony moving metal parts around.

Some time later, Steve closed his book and looked up to see Anthony had set his screwdriver away and was now raising the upper half of the armour, chestplate and backplate still screwed together. The piece seemed impossibly big in Anthony’s hands and Steve knew it was made of sturdy metal.

Steve frowned _. Surely he can’t hope to do it alone._ “Do you need a hand with that?” he asked.

Anthony startled. For a long terrible second, Steve was sure he’d drop the part and damage it but he caught his balance. “It’s okay,” he said. “It’s lighter than it seems.” He did set it down then, with no rush, as if it was no effort at all.

“Or you’re stronger than _you_ seem,” Steve said. It made sense, he supposed. All that metalwork that Anthony did had to pay off.

“I’ve got nothing on you, Captain America,” Anthony laughed. He walked to Steve, his every movement graceful; he’d been working on the armour for a few hours now and he still looked as fresh as if he’d only just gotten dressed. He stood near Steve’s chair, his hands resting on his hips. He was wearing shirtsleeves, clearly dressed for a more theoretical and less hands-on kind of engineering than he ended up doing tonight. Steve could definitely appreciate the way the shirt hugged his silhouette. “I can take a break now, I suppose.”

“You should read this when you have a moment,” Steve offered, lifting the book to let Anthony see the title. “I’m almost done.”

“The Hobbit or There and Back Again,” Anthony read. “You did seem pretty engrossed.”

“It’s magical,” Steve said. He put the book away and stood up to avoid getting a crick in his neck from looking up. Anthony was almost as tall as Steve. He smiled, in that way of his where he just lifted one corner of his mouth, as if amused by some joke known only to him. 

Their eyes met, and there was an _intent_ in Anthony’s gaze, the way his blue eyes seemed dark as a storm now. He reached out, and Steve stood still as Anthony’s hand caressed his cheek; smooth, long, unexpectedly cold fingers. Steve leant in his touch almost without any conscious thought.

He wondered what this meant to Anthony. Steve _liked_ him, but it was the war: you took comfort where you could. Maybe Anthony only wanted the touch of another living being. Maybe Steve should stop him and ask. Maybe—

Anthony’s lips were as cold as his fingers, but soft and moist. He sucked on Steve’s lower lip, and Steve stopped worrying and started acting, tangled his hand in Anthony’s hair and kissed him back hungrily.

There was something, a hint of _danger_ at the back of his mind, out of nowhere; he ignored it. Whatever they did here would not endanger their working relationship in the field, he was sure of that, and nothing else really mattered. Anthony was making it incredibly hard for him to think. He was a very talented kisser and even though his hands were still icy-cold on the sides of Steve’s face, Steve felt hot all over, dizzy with lust and arousal.

He broke the kiss and gulped down air. Anthony looked at him, licking his own lips, and then leant in again, kissing the corner of Steve’s mouth, moving to his jaw. Steve clutched at him, holding on as Anthony licked down his neck and nuzzled at his pulse point, worrying the skin between his teeth.

Steve let out a shaky breath, his fingers digging into Anthony’s arms, holding on when his knees went weak.

Anthony shuddered under him, and Steve let him go, suddenly afraid he’d hurt him. He was stronger than he’d used to be. Anthony stood very still for a few seconds, his face hidden in the nook of Steve’s neck.

“Sorry, I—” Steve fumbled. “Sorry, are you okay, I’m not used to my strength quite yet—”

“You—” Anthony straightened slowly. His eyes were very, very dark. A sudden fear made the hair on the back of Steve’s neck stand up and he looked away from Anthony, feeling utterly ridiculous. It figured he’d be more scared facing a man he was beginning to care about than when fighting Nazis.

“ _You_ didn’t hurt me.” Anthony’s inflection was weird, but Steve couldn’t put his finger on why. His gaze flickered down to Steve’s neck; he looked back at Steve’s face with what seemed like a lot of effort. “I’m not sure your uniform will cover that,” he said.

Steve laughed. “I heal fast.”

“So you do.” Anthony took a step away from him and Steve felt an indeterminable loss. “Let’s take it slower, Captain,” he said.

It was so different from the _we could all die tomorrow, let’s make the most of it_ line that Steve had expected that he was momentarily stunned; Anthony watching him warily. “Sure,” Steve said when he found his voice again.

“I’m sorry I got carried away,” Anthony said after another moment.

“I’m _not_ complaining,” Steve told him. He was really, really not. Anthony could get carried away any time he wanted, if it was up to Steve. And they’d hardly even done anything.

“You should probably go now.” Anthony turned so that Steve could only see his profile. He was inhaling and exhaling steadily, long deep breaths as if to calm down. Steve could sympathize. 

But if Anthony _didn’t_ want anything else to happen tonight, Steve should listen to his advice. Every second standing there and not touching Anthony was harder than the last.

“See you tomorrow?” he asked hopefully.

“If I didn’t scare you away,” Anthony answered, and Steve could’ve laughed at the mere suggestion.

***

 _Now_ :

“Morning, Jan,” Steve says drily as someone covers his eyes from behind. It’s a good thing he’s heard her coming. 

“No fun.” She lowers her hands and stands in front of him. She’s wearing a lovely orange dress with an asymmetrical cut to make it longer in the centre, like a drop of water. Every time Steve sees her, he understands why she’s such a popular fashion designer. She _is_ great: very good at picking colours and fabric. “Oooh, you’re drawing again! Maybe I should start designing in the garden too.”

Steve gives her a smile. “I’ve always preferred to sketch outside,” he explains.

“I like air-conditioned places, in general,” Jan replies. “But a change is good sometimes.”

“I had eighty years of a change,” Steve says, surprised that the joke comes so easily.

Jan pats him on the head, compassion in her eyes. 

“What are you up to today?” Steve asks to break the silence.

“Not much.” Jan sits in the grass, cross-legged, and smooths her dress on her knees. “I’m meeting with Tony very soon. He wants some new clothes. I’m happy to help, though I’d be even happier if he showed himself out in public every once in a while.” She makes a face, but Steve can see she’s talking with genuine warmth.

“You know him?” he asks, trying to appear nonchalant. 

Jan shrugs. “A bit.” She purses her lips, as if thinking. “He’s . . . I think he’s lost someone.”

“Oh,” Steve says. He’d expected a story about an eccentric genius, really. He should’ve known better. No man would isolate himself like Mister Stark does for some frivolous reason.

“Don’t get me wrong,” Jan says. “He is nice, whatever you may hear about him. But he likes to keep himself at a distance.” 

“He wouldn’t help me if he weren’t nice,” Steve notes. “So I know that much.”

Jan laughs. “True. Though really, he should at least introduce himself to you. Basic manners, you know.”

Steve shrugs. He doesn’t mind that at all. He won’t meet Mister Stark any time soon if the choice is up to him. He knows he would try to look for traces of Anthony in him, and there’s nothing good waiting down that road. In a way, Mister Stark’s own self-banishment is a blessing to Steve.

“It’s okay,” he says when Jan keeps looking at him as if waiting for his answer. He knows that’s not what she hoped to hear, but he can’t help it. It’s the truth.

They talk a bit more, and then she gets up. “Okay, it’s noon, I have to go. Earlier than our usual meetings, I have to say.”

Steve bids her goodbye and goes back to his drawing.

The conversation stays with him all day though, and he can’t quite focus on anything else. He almost hopes for the Avengers alert to sound but nothing happens, as if the villains are taking a day off. It’s a good thing, he chastises himself. But he needs a distraction.

He decides on getting some training in. The Mansion really is equipped with just about anything he could wish for. Steve likes the gym the most, if he doesn’t count the library. He can unwind there and escape his reality in a very different way from visiting other worlds through the written word.

It’s not working today. He goes through his warm-up, the push-ups, and a stretching routine before he’s ready for anything else. He tries a few gymnastics figures, but while usually they help him find balance, today he just can’t stop thinking about Anthony.

He hadn’t looked it, but he was very strong. They’d sparred, once, and Steve had ended up on his back in record time. He didn’t mind—he can admit it _was_ kinda hot. 

“Where did you train?” he’d asked, later.

“Oh, I’ve done callisthenics,” Anthony laughed. Then he grew serious. “Physically, I can’t match you, but—Steve, you _are_ new to fighting. I have years of experience.”

“Of callisthenics,” Steve teased, and Anthony just smiled. 

That conversation stayed with Steve; that was why he asked for hand-to-hand combat classes later on. His commanding officer had thought Steve was crazy, before Steve repeated that before the serum he definitely hadn’t fought anyone, so he should get some training before getting hurt or hurting someone else. Because Anthony had been right. After the serum, Steve was stronger and faster, and some things came instinctively to him—but he didn’t have any actual training in martial arts.

He lands badly from another jump, rolls to his side almost without thinking, and only then does he touch his ankle. _Enough_ , he decides. He hasn’t injured himself, thankfully, but he really should finish exercising for today. His head really isn’t in the training.

He misses Anthony. Of course he does. That’s the point. He wanted to get tired in the gym, punch the punching bag a bit, _stop thinking_ , but clearly it won’t work today.

He slowly stands, testing his ankle again, but he can put his weight on it just fine.

Steve glances at the punching bag with longing, but he knows it’s not a good idea. Anthony didn’t teach him that—didn’t teach him anything, really, he was just the first person to point out Steve’s problem. But that one conversation had saved Steve’s life later so many times and Anthony probably never even knew. Whatever Steve does in the gym today, the ghost of Anthony will follow him.

Steve hangs his head low. He knows what he has to do. He’s been putting off doing it since he learnt just whose house the Avengers stay in, but he can’t ignore it anymore.

He sighs. He needs a shower first. It’s a necessity, after training, not just more putting off what he doesn’t want to do. But maybe searching for Anthony will help. Maybe reading that he had a good life will settle Steve down. At the very least, he will stop wondering: the man clearly started a family, but was he happy?

Steve’s not sure he can find the answer in the official information on the internet, but it has to be better than guessing.

***

 _Then_ :

It was very dark; the sky was clear, but the moon was still almost hidden, only the barest crescent visible. The night was calm, with no wind to give an illusion of creatures in the darkness. Steve was glad of the stilness also because it was surprisingly cold for an August evening and the last thing he wanted was to freeze in the wind chill.

He turned right when he reached the end of the perimeter undisturbed. He’d found he rather liked patrolling. The watch guards closer to the base did great job, true, but Steve didn’t like being confined to one place, so being able to go even a bit further out was good. And this way, one more soldier got to sleep at night: Steve didn’t need a partner to keep him safe.

Then someone grabbed his shoulder and turned him around, hard. Steve immediately threw a punch, but it was blocked easily, and then he saw his attacker’s face. It was the blond man he’d seen in Tony’s lab a few days before.

“So you’re Anthony’s newest obsession,” he said, and then he leant in and _smelled_ Steve. “Mm, yes, I can see the attraction.”

 _Does Anthony know his friend is a madman_ , Steve thought as he tried to break the grip the other man still had on his arm. His eyes widened when he couldn’t move him an inch. He was clearly super-powered, but _how_?

The man’s eyes shone bright red. “Don’t wo—” he snapped his head around and swore under his breath. “He’s _always_ had terrible timing. _Look at me_.”

Steve obeyed, unable not to. The voice left him no choice whatsoever, and so he listened, enthralled.

“Forget the last five minutes,” Tiberius said. “You’ve never seen me here.”

Then he was gone.

Steve shook himself. Why had he turned around? He had to finish the perimeter. It had been an uneventful night so far. He’d found he rather liked patrolling. The watch guards closer to the base did great job, true, but Steve didn’t like being confined to one place, so being able to go even a bit further out was good. And this way, one more soldier got to sleep at night: Steve didn’t need a partner to keep him safe.

“Taking in some fresh air?” someone asked.

Steve almost jumped: he’d been sure he was completely alone. He twirled around, dropping into a defensive pose with his shield in front of him, a protection and a threat in one. 

Anthony was standing a few steps behind him completely at ease, as if he belonged here, outside the base in the dead of the night. He raised his hands as an afterthought, long after Steve had identified him. “I’m unarmed.”

“Then you shouldn’t be here,” Steve snapped, putting the shield back on his back. He evened out his breathing, but his heart was still beating wildly in his chest.

“Oh, but I’m feeling very safe next to you,” Anthony said. “Nothing more dangerous around, can there be?” His voice was laced with amusement. 

Steve gave him a glare. “You really shouldn’t be taking risks.”

“I’m not. Spar with me one day,” Anthony offered, his gaze intense. 

Steve was suddenly glad for how dark it was: Anthony couldn’t see him blush. Anthony walked up to him, slowly; Steve noticed he was wearing a long, velvety cloak to guard against the cold. A curious choice for a forest walk, in Steve’s opinion. Anthony reached out, smoothing Steve’s jacket with his hand, not even pretending it was anything but an excuse to touch Steve. Steve very definitely didn’t mind, but he was _on duty_ , and for a long moment responsibility and desire battled within him.

“I’m patrolling,” Steve finally forced himself to say instead of leaning into him like he wanted.

“Are you,” Anthony said, unperturbed. “Guess I’ll have to finish the round with you.”

He stepped away and started going in the direction Steve had been heading before Anthony called him. Steve followed him. “I didn’t hear you approach,” he said.

“I know the terrain,” Anthony answered. “I’ve been here longer than you, remember.”

That was true enough, if still surprising. Anthony really could move very quietly. Steve was curious what kind of a training he’d had, because clearly his skills went way past being a brilliant engineer. He didn’t seem that much older than Steve, but Steve really wouldn’t be shocked if Anthony were in Intelligence. Then again, he didn’t even try to act like a normal soldier. He’d make a terrible spy.

They walked in silence after that, though Steve kept stealing little glances at Anthony, noting his sure step. He didn’t seem to fear the dark at all, which was a good thing. Most of their missions took place at night, after all.

The rest of the patrol was thankfully uneventful: there weren’t even any animals on the ground, no squirrels and no rabbits jumping away, though for a moment he’d thought he’d seen bats high in the sky. Steve didn’t notice anything out of place as he turned the last corner and led them closer to the base— _led them_ , as if Anthony needed the guidance, which he clearly didn’t. 

“Your relief is waiting,” Anthony noted. “Two-man team?”

“Yeah, normal soldiers patrol in pai—” Steve cut himself off and frowned. He knew they were getting closer to the change point, but he couldn’t yet see anyone. 

“Captain?”

“You have good eye sight.” 

“So I do,” Anthony agreed. “I’m Iron Man, remember. All pilots have to see well.”

Steve kept looking at him. Anthony sighed. He touched his hand to Steve’s face. “Come on,” he said. “You’re almost off duty, don’t stop now.” His thumb rubbed at Steve’s lower lip, and suddenly all Steve could think of was licking his finger, kissing his hand, pulling him closer and sneaking hands under his soft cloak—

 _Time and place_ , he told himself.

“You make a compelling argument.”

Anthony gave him a grin that said he was well aware of that, and stepped out of Steve’s reach again.

Steve finally saw his relief a dozen steps later and quickened his pace. Anthony, predictably, didn’t complain.

“All clear,” Steve told the pair. They were newly transferred and he didn’t know their names yet. They saluted him, he saluted back, and then the new pair was on patrol and Steve was finally free to spend time with Anthony like he wanted.

They kept walking for a bit until they got closer to the inner perimeter now, but still out of the sight of the watchtowers on a night as dark as this.

Steve caught Anthony’s wrist and pulled him closer, catching his lips in a kiss before Anthony had a chance to say anything at all. His skin was cold again, despite the cloak he wore, and Steve wrapped his arms around him to warm him up even as he kept kissing him. He was rewarded with a strangled noise from Anthony’s throat and he thought he’d really like to hear it again. 

Anthony broke the kiss, then. “ _Steve_ ,” he whispered, breathless, his voice breaking after the first sound briefly.

It was the first time he’d really used Steve’s name and Steve wasn’t prepared for the rush of blood in his ears when he heard Anthony’s smooth voice say it, less like a name and more like a caress.

“When I found you on this patrol,” Anthony continued in a quiet voice, “I wanted to suggest star-gazing. It’s the Perseids tonight.”

“Sure,” Steve said. “No nefarious plans at all.”

“Oh, this is not _nefarious_ ,” Anthony said, kissing Steve to illustrate his words. “Unless you need your beauty sleep. I am rather nocturnal.”

“Army discipline didn’t get to you, then,” Steve commented.

“I’m just a consultant,” Anthony replied, and then they were kissing again, hungrily, like nothing else even mattered—and in that moment, nothing did.

***

_Now:_

He grabs his tablet from the night stand. He loves the device—he can use it to draw and he can fit ten shelves full of books on it, and he’s not sure which is more fun. He knows what he’s about to do won’t be anywhere near fun though, and he doesn’t want to read about Anthony within the walls of his own room. It would be too hard, too lonely, somehow. He heads to the library. No one is there at this time of the day, so he should have privacy while also not feeling completely isolated from the world. He sits on his favourite sofa, steeling himself.

He searches for Anthony Stark and tells himself to breathe, but it’s hard to keep calm. It’s not some historical article he’s looking for, it’s his—

His what? Anthony and him, they weren’t anything settled. It was the war.

He opens the Wikipedia page first, sees there’s no picture attached and closes his eyes. It’s both better and worse. He’d hoped to see an older Anthony. He’s not sure he could deal with the reality of it.

 _Read it_ , he tells himself. It’ll be better to know. So he opens his eyes and looks at the page: Anthony Edward Stark (1920-1945).

Wait, _what_?

He stares at it, but the numbers don’t rearrange themselves to make any kind of sense. But it’s impossible, no, he couldn’t have—

Steve scrolls down, feeling as if he’s detached from his own body. There’s no _Personal Life_ section and he scrolls through _Work_ , straight to _Death_.

_Anthony Stark died in the last days of World War 2, piloting the Iron Man suit. It malfunctioned and exploded with the pilot still inside. He was en route to his assigned base, having achieved—_

Steve stops reading. He’s not interested in what Anthony might’ve achieved there, he’s interested in the fact that _Anthony hadn’t lived through the war_. Like Steve. But Steve’s here now, and Anthony’s just _gone_.

When he was told that the Mister Stark who took him in was Anthony’s Stark grandson, Steve had assumed he’d a happy life, with a loving wife and a happy ending. Not that he’d died so young. That’s another surprise, though: Anthony hadn’t looked older than Steve, not really, but there was something ageless about him, something eternal. Steve never could’ve imagine him dying. It makes everything so much worse.

What if Steve hadn’t go down with his plane? What if he’d been there to help, the way it should’ve been? Captain America and Iron Man were only ever successful together. 

He throws the tablet away, hard. There’s a sound like glass breaking, but he doesn’t care. Anthony died in the war. Maybe Steve could’ve helped. Or maybe they’d just never had a chance of having something more. 

When Steve’s plane went down, one of his last thoughts had been, _Let Anthony be okay_.

His hands are shaking as he lifts them to his face, to clumsily wipe away his tears. He’s angry for so many reasons. Angry at himself that he’s crying, even though he’d known Anthony was dead and this doesn’t really change anything. Angry at the world that separated them. Angry that he got to wake up again, alive, and Anthony didn’t, and angry that he misses him so much still, and he misses home, and he wants to just _go back_. 

He thought he was making this century his home, and now he’s just lost.

“Cap?”

Steve stills, or he tries to, but he keeps shaking with sobs. He presses his hands to his face, not wanting Iron Man to see his red eyes, and thankfully, Iron Man doesn’t comment. But he doesn’t leave, either; there’s no sound of steps receding and the door closing. He’s never here at this time. Why has he come now? Why?

“Should I go?” Iron Man asks.

 _Yes_ , Steve thinks, but he can’t make himself say it. Being alone is the last thing he wants. But he hates that his teammate is seeing him like this.

“Look, Steve,” Iron Man sighs. “I’ll go if you want me to, but you rather look like you need someone. And that’s okay.”

There’s something in his voice, even through the filters. _Understanding_. As if Iron Man has lost someone too. Come to think of it, Steve’s not sure why Iron Man even puts on the armour. He doesn’t need to know, but . . . He thinks it might be connected. He keeps saying he’s a bodyguard and that Mister Stark pays him, but Steve really doubts Iron Man’s Avengers activities have anything to do with bodyguarding. They do have a lot to do with helping people at whatever cost.

Anthony was like that too.

“I barely knew him,” Steve lets out finally, his voice brittle to his own ears. He has to fight for breath. “I loved him.”

Iron Man doesn’t say anything for a long while. The silence is so absolute Steve almost thinks he’s alone, but then there are steps, and someone sitting next to him. 

“Anthony,” Iron Man says slowly.

Steve just nods. There’s another tense, silent moment, before Iron Man hugs him.

“I’m sorry,” he says. 

_It’s not your fault. It’s no one’s fault_ , Steve thinks, but he keeps quiet. The hug isn’t entirely comfortable: the armour is hard, if pleasantly warm, and it’s nothing like hugging a real person. But Iron Man has grown to be a friend, and if this is the only way they can touch each other, Steve doesn’t mind. He leans into Iron Man, ignoring how strange it feels, and lets himself be held.

Iron Man keeps running his hand up and down Steve’s back—gently, so very gently, and it’s only this which really beats the realisation into Steve: there are repulsors hidden in his gauntlets, and Steve isn’t in the slightest bit afraid. He’s just grateful for the comfort he didn’t expect. 

“Thank you,” Steve says finally, moving back. His voice is still trembling, but he’s no longer crying and he doesn’t feel like he’s going to break into a hundred little pieces anymore.

“Always, Cap,” Iron Man says.

“Call me Steve.” After this, it really will be more natural.

Iron Man doesn’t respond. Instead, he crosses the room and lifts the tablet Steve hurled in desperation. “Well, this is broken,” he comments. “Not your fault. Mister Stark really should’ve made a version for superstrong people. Would come in handy for using in the armour too.”

“Sorry,” Steve says anyway. He shouldn’t have thrown it like that.

Iron Man sighs. “Told you, not your fault. I’ll—Mister Stark will fix it, no problem.”

Steve’s face goes red with embarrassment. “Can you just say I dropped it?” he asks after a brief fight with himself. He _shouldn’t_ expect Iron Man to lie to his employer, for god’s sake, but he doesn’t want more people to know about his pathetic breakdown.

Iron Man looks at him for a long moment before nodding curtly. “Don’t worry about it.”

He turns to leave, and Steve’s both disappointed and relieved.

“Steve?” Iron Man asks, sounding unsure. The way he says Steve’s name, it sounds so similar to how Anthony said it in the armour that it takes Steve’s breath away, but he refuses to break down again.

“He went down just days after you.” He hesitates. “What you felt . . . You might not have been the only one.”

He leaves, taking the broken tablet with him, and Steve just stares after him. He couldn’t have said that. Steve couldn’t have heard correctly.

Because it just wasn’t _fair_ otherwise.

***

 _Then_ :

“Nice to see you again, Iron Man!” Steve grinned. He hadn’t seen Anthony for a few dull weeks when Steve was working on destroying a Hydra lab in western Germany. 

“You too.” It was always hard to read Anthony’s tone through the armour speakers, but Steve wanted to think he sounded pleased too. 

They went through the plan quickly—Iron Man would drop Steve off behind the POW camp and then rain hell on it from the front, diverting attention. The unpowered group of soldiers was already on the move so they would be ready to help with fighting and evacuation as soon as Iron Man and Captain America arrived. 

They’d done it a hundred times.

“Remember,” Anthony said as they were flying through the night, “Wait till you hear me.”

“I know.” Steve really didn’t need babysitting . . . But he could understand the worry, and so he added, “You keep safe too.”

“Always,” Anthony replied, for a brief moment holding Steve tighter against the armour’s side.

Everything went according to the plan, after that: Steve waited for the explosions to start and got in through the back gate, followed by other soldiers. They were getting the prisoners out when Steve noticed a new wave of Hydra goons surfacing from inside the barracks.

He was sure he’d knocked the last of them out when he felt a sharp pain in his abdomen. He bent over, pressing his hands to his stomach. He couldn’t—he had to—

Steve fell to his knees. There were hands holding him up; his vision was too blurry to recognize the faces.

“He’s bleeding a lot—someone get Iron Man!”

He must’ve blacked out for a moment. The next thing he heard was a loud, “Fuck!” in Iron Man’s mechanized voice.

“Captain? Cap, look at me— _Steve_!”

There was only darkness.

He woke to sharp light and disinfectants in the air; he reached out, not really sure he why he expected to feel familiar, cool fingers grasping his, but there was no one there.

The next time he woke up, someone was touching his elbow. He wanted to move away but he was too weak for even that, and he cracked his eyes open. A nurse was next to him, taping the IV line to his skin.

“Don’t move,” she said the moment she noticed he was awake. “You lost a lot of blood, we’re still running transfusions. I’ll call a doctor.”

But Steve blacked out again.

He healed fast. Soon, he was conscious again and getting increasingly more bored. “I’m fine,” he insisted, and over and over he heard, “No you’re not”, and he wanted to rip the IV out and sneak back to the battlefield.

He learnt he was in a hospital just near the border with the Netherlands; not that far from his base. He wasn’t always alone: sometimes Dugan or Gabriel visited. He heard that everyone else had evacuated just fine and he was glad to hear that.

The only problem was, _Anthony wasn’t there_.

Steve would never admit it aloud, of course, and he knew he was stupid for even hoping otherwise. Anthony was a busy man, with a lot of responsibilities of his own. There was no reason for him to wait at Steve’s bedside, or even visit, really. A few kisses didn’t a relationship make. Steve _knew_.

But if it were Anthony in a hospital bed, Steve would be there.

One night he woke up certain someone was in the room with him: a kind of a cold presence. He kept his eyes closed and listened: there was nothing beyond the usual creaks of an old building, no steps, no rustle of clothing, not even breathing. He opened his eyes then, cautious; he thought there was a darker shadow in the corner, but when he clicked on the light, there was nothing.

  
  


Art by MassiveSpaceWren

He was supposed to be back to normal, let out tomorrow; it was too late to be getting hallucinations.

He was more than happy to be able to dress in normal clothes again in the morning. He thanked his doctors and the nurses and walked out of the hospital into a cool, cloudy day. He sighed, looking around for a military transport. He’d thought he’d be getting to the base with new soldiers, but instead there was a normal car at the entrance, its door opening when Steve walked closer.

He looked inside. “Is—Anthony!” He hadn’t recognized him immediately because Anthony had a hat pulled low over his face, but it was undoubtedly him, waiting for Steve. He was in the driver’s seat and was looking Steve up and down as if expecting to see the healed wound through his clothing.

“All better now, I hope,” Anthony said in lieu of a hello. 

Steve slid into the car and closed the door. “I’m fine,” he said. “I didn’t expect you.” Well, that was a lie. He had expected Anthony, just . . . earlier. But he was glad he was here now.

“Someone has to make sure you make it back to base safely.” Anthony gave him a look before starting the car; Steve noticed he had black gloves, too. “Please be more careful, Steve.” He kept his eyes steadily on the very empty road in front of him, but Steve could hear the emotions in his voice. “ _You_ don’t have an armour.”

“I—whoever stabbed me, he was moving fast.”

“Yes.” Anthony’s voice was very, very cold. “She was. It was not just a POW camp; they ran their own experiments, too.”

He didn’t say more, and Steve didn’t ask. He knew perfectly well what Nazis were capable of. It was why he had joined the war in the first place: to stop them.

“Didn’t you promise me a sparring match?” Steve asked some miles later. Anthony’s driving was on the reckless side, and Steve who was used to military drivers found himself gripping his seat when they went around turns. It was surprising: Anthony was always so careful when he was piloting Iron Man and flying somewhere with Steve.

“Ha. No.” Anthony’s expression was pained. “You got stabbed in the stomach, Steve, I am not making it worse.”

“I’m _fine_ ,” Steve insisted.

“After _ten days_ ,” Anthony replied incredulously. “I _know_ what the serum can do, and I’m telling you, no.”

Steve pouted, but only because he knew Anthony wouldn’t see. “Boredom can be lethal, you know.”

“We’d never have met if it were,” Anthony replied. He reached with his right hand and touched Steve’s cheek, just for a second; the fact that it was soft leather and not actually Anthony’s bare skin touching Steve somehow only made it more intimate, not less. “ _Please_ take care.”

Steve couldn’t make himself reply to that, not when Anthony’s voice was so soft.

***

 _Now_ :

Anthony is standing in the shadow of an old tree. It’s the summer of 1946, hot, and Steve’s never been happier to see him.

“Steve,” Anthony calls, waving at him.

Steve smiles and raises his hand to let him know he sees him. He doesn’t run, but he quickens his steps. He can never reach Anthony fast enough, and he goes, faster and faster.

Anthony is still far away.

Steve starts running, but it’s like it doesn’t matter, because the world is pushing them further apart. Anthony is far away, too far to touch him, too far to kiss him, and Steve runs as fast as he can and can’t get any closer to him.

Finally, Steve stops, panting from the exertion. “Anthony,” he whispers, but his voice carries over the distance. “I love you.”

Anthony shivers. “Maybe,” he says with a sad expression. “And I love you.”

“Let me—”

“We’re in different worlds now, aren’t we?” Anthony asks.

Summer 1946, Steve remembers, shocked as if he touched a live wire because neither of them lived to see it.

Even as he realises it’s a nightmare—it must be—he can’t help screaming in horror as he sees Anthony dissolve into a river of blood.

He can’t move. He can’t wake up. He can’t do anything.

The blood reaches him, slowly, and he can feel it on his toes—

Steve sits up, breathing heavily. His throat is dry and his hands are fisted in the sheets. He physically shakes himself to push the memories of the dream away, but they stay crystal clear in his mind. He shivers. 

Maybe he shouldn’t have read Anthony’s biography. Maybe he should’ve stayed in the ice.

He wraps his arms around his knees and tries to stop shaking. Anthony’s pained expression from the dream won’t leave him. Steve keeps his eyes open and looks at something, anything, everything in his room: the square of the window, dimly lit from the outside, the dark, empty corners, the table with Steve’s sketchbook on it.

His breathing calms down, after a while, but Steve doesn’t try sleeping again. He doesn’t want any more nightmares, so he finally convinces himself to stand up. He goes straight to his desk, switches on the lamp over it, takes a deep breath, and reaches for his pencils. 

He sketches the background first, the way he usually goes about it, but currently mostly he needs to know where and _when_ he is. He wants to draw the modern New York that he knows, but instead he draws the Mansion as seen from the garden. He draws Jan, and Hank, and Iron Man: the Avengers, and himself next to them. It’s quick and messy, but he’s not trying to do anything else here. He just wants to calm down.

He’s in twenty-first century and it’s okay. It _is._

Finally, he turns the page. His hands aren’t shaking, but he can’t quite believe he’s controlling his own movements as he starts drawing Anthony.

He’d never really seen him in good light, but that’s not a problem. He remembers him as if he saw him yesterday. He picks a relatively safe memory, nothing _personal_ : Anthony pale and tired yet smiling after another successful mission. His hair reached his shoulders, dark and silky. He had a moustache that scratched at Steve’s face when they kissed. He was always looking at Steve with a bone-thrilling intensity. 

A loud sound snaps Steve out of his memories, and he realises he’s just broken his pencil. 

He looks at his sketch. He managed to sketch Anthony’s silhouette, and some details of his face, enough to make him recognizable. Suddenly, Steve doesn’t want to see what it would look like if he finished the drawing, or worse, made a full painting.

This one is too real all on its own, and he knows he won’t touch it again.

He rips the page out. He won’t crumple it or throw it away, of course not, but he wants to keep it somewhere more private than in his sketchbook. For now, he’ll just put it in his drawer. He’s being illogical, he realises that, but it clearly was a bad idea to read up on Anthony and have all these barely healed hurts opened anew.

Steve gets up, and as he picks up the piece of paper he slides it over his finger. There’s a sudden sharp pain, and he swears, raising the finger to his mouth. Paper cut. As if that night could’ve gotten any worse. He sucks on the scratch, and uses his left hand to hide the drawing in his drawer.

He glances at the clock on his night stand. 5:30 am. Maybe he should just grab a sandwich and go for a run to clear his thoughts. The sun should rise soon.

Steve steps out of his room, still sucking on his finger—it’ll stop bleeding soon, he knows, but it still itches—and stops mid-step, frozen.

There’s—there’s no one else in the corridor. Which is normal at that hour.

Except, for barely a second, Steve was sure he saw Anthony. 

_Stop being ridiculous_ , he tells himself. 

He goes to the kitchen, and he can hear someone moving inside from afar. No longer sure what to expect, he steps quietly, ready to leave, but it’s only Jarvis. Steve sighs with relief.

“Morning, Jarvis,” he says.

“Good morning, Captain Rogers,” Jarvis replies. “Do you wish for a breakfast?”

“Thanks, I just wanted to grab a sandwich.” Jarvis is a great cook, but Steve doesn’t want to give him more work so early in the morning. Speaking of which . . . “You’re up early,” Steve says. He usually only meets Jarvis after returning from his morning run.

Jarvis smiles as he reaches for bread. “It’s not a problem,” he says, and then he explains, “Mister Stark needed me _.”_

Steve feels silly.

He must’ve seen Mister Stark in the corridor. And Steve’s heard so many times he’s an elusive, private man. No wonder he didn’t talk to a virtual stranger.

(Virtual stranger he’d opened his home to. Steve won’t stop marvelling at that.)

Jarvis puts a glass of orange juice in front of Steve, and Steve smiles at him gratefully before downing it. He’s weirdly out of sorts. He eats the offered sandwich, too, and feels slightly guilty when Jarvis takes his dishes to wash them. 

“Thank you,” he says.

“Of course, Captain,” Jarvis answers. 

“What’s he like?” Steve blurts out suddenly.

Jarvis raises on eyebrow. “Mister Stark?”

Steve nods.

Jarvis seems to consider the question. “He’s a brilliant inventor and a good man,” he says. Steve’s heard as much, and it’s exactly what he could expect from Anthony’s descendant. “Don’t be hard on him if you meet him, Captain.”

“I’d never,” Steve starts to reassure Jarvis, because the last think he’d want is to offend in any way the man who gave Steve so much, before he realises how uncharacteristic of Jarvis that was. He’s always perfectly professional, kind but distanced. That request, well, that was personal, and Steve wonders what exactly prompted Jarvis to say that. Avoiding everyone the way Mister Stark does goes way past someone’s little quirks, but really, Steve can’t judge. Sometimes he wishes he could just stay in bed forever, or maybe wake up back in 1945. 

“Captain?” Jarvis asks, sounding worried.

Steve shakes his head. “I’m fine. And you don’t have to worry about Mister Stark.”

Jarvis nods, once. 

Steve hesitates. There’s one more thing he wants to ask about with regards to Mister Stark and he thinks Jarvis might know the answer. “Um. I read that Anthony died in the war.” God, saying it _hurts_. “But he had kids.”

“He had a son when he was twenty,” Jarvis confirms. “It was a bit of a scandalous affair, from what I’ve heard, what with him not being married or even planning to be, but he gave the kid his name all the same.”

That clears up that question, then, and yeah, Steve can imagine Anthony with an _adventurous_ youth.

“I see. Thanks.” Steve gets up. “I’m going for a run,” he says. “I’m taking the comms, if the Avengers need me.”

“Enjoy your jog, Captain.”

Steve feels better the moment he steps out into the sun. He wasn’t cold, not exactly, but there’s something to be said about the feeling of sunlight on your skin that warms you to your very insides. For a few seconds Steve just stands there, barely a few steps out the door, basking in sunlight. 

He’s always likes being outside, and he’s liked physical exertion since he got the serum, but he never used to feel something like _relief_ at stepping into the sun. Like something he was worrying about just disappeared. He sighs as he thinks it’s another thing the ice must’ve changed.

He jumps in place a few times, mostly to distract himself. He wants to stop thinking.

It’s still early enough that not many people are out, which he appreciates. He leaves the Mansion’s garden and turns right, and then he just jogs down the street. He’s not trying to get tired—that would take _a lot—_ but he likes moving, and it’s nice out. The touch of sun on his back still almost grounds him.

He jogs for maybe an hour. He’s built up a light sweat, and he feels much more energised now. And really, it’s not like today can really get any worse, after the night he’s had. He could ask Iron Man to take him flying again. It’d be nice to just relax, without any villains wreaking havoc first. 

Day-dreaming, he returns to the Mansion. He doesn’t expect to see a ghost inside. 

It’s Tony Stark, it has to be, standing at the bottom of the stairs, just outside of the sunlight falling in through the still-open door.

Steve can’t move.

“Close the door, will you?” Mister Stark drawls. His voice is the same as Anthony’s, but his pronunciation is different, a New York accent to his words.

Steve’s heart is beating wildly in his chest. He’s staring, he realises, and he forces himself to school his features into something neutral.

Tony Stark looks at him with a raised eyebrow. “I was told I was similar to my grandfather.”

 _Similar_ is a bit of an understatement. He’s a carbon copy: the same blue eyes, the same elegant features, the same lean silhouette. The details differ though: he’s got a neatly trimmed goatee and he’s wearing a modern business suit that Steve can’t imagine Anthony ever putting on.

“Mister Stark,” Steve says, trying to recover. “I’m—”

Mister Stark waves his hand. “We both know who we are,” he says. “Door, please?”

Steve ducks his head, embarrassed, and closes it quickly. He’s not sure how to proceed here. He didn’t expect to actually meet the man. “Can I help you?” he asks.

“The contrary.” Mister Stark sounds amused, but his expression is hard to read. “I got you a new tablet.” He holds his hand out, presenting the device to Steve.

“Thanks,” Steve says, and then the situation catches up to him completely. “Uh. In general, Mister Stark. I’m grateful you’re letting me—”

“Goes without saying,” Mister Stark cuts in. “And I should be thanking you for helping the Avengers out.”

“Goes without saying,” Steve echoes back at him.

“Okay then,” Mister Stark says. “Have a good day, Captain America.”

Without further ado, he turns away. Steve follows him with his eyes as he goes up the stairs and disappears down a side corridor.

***

 _Then_ :

Going to the dances was Anthony’s idea, of course—Steve didn’t have the slightest clue what to do when music started playing. Looking at Anthony, Steve definitely did not regret letting himself be talked into it. If the thrill of a real date hadn’t been enough to convince him it would be great, the way Anthony looked now certainly was. Steve had no idea where he’d found the clothes, as he himself was wearing his dress uniform, but Anthony had on a wide-sleeved shirt and a dark blue, delicately embroidered vest that highlighted his eyes, complete with a cravat at his neck. Steve found himself putting his hand on Anthony’s waist as if to lead him to dance immediately, leaning in to kiss him hello. 

“Mm, you do look sharp.” Anthony sounded appreciative. “But none of that.” He tapped at Steve’s hands and Steve obediently let him go. “Dancing, Steve, with actual music.”

“I told you I can’t dance,” Steve reminded him as he followed Anthony to the car. 

Anthony just shrugged one elegant arm. “Worry not. I’m a decent dancer. I can handle you.”

Steve couldn’t help thinking Anthony was a bit too optimistic in this regard.

They got in the car and Steve rapidly understood that Anthony’s driving wasn’t any better in the dark. 

“At least turn on the headlights,” he said. “We don’t actually have to be stealthy now.”

“Right,” Anthony said. “Power of habit.” He flicked the lights on, so that Steve could see all the better the close calls with the trees near the road.

“You’re more careful with the armour,” he said.

“It’s also slightly more dangerous,” Anthony replied. “And I _have_ seen you on a motorbike, Captain. You can’t throw any stones here.”

“Touché.”

They arrived at the dance hall and Anthony parked the car with a squeal of tyres. They went in together, both of them throwing some change in the metal donation box, and were immediately assaulted with loud music from the live band.

“Do you want something to drink?” Anthony asked, pointing at the bar.

“What are you having?” Steve asked.

Anthony looked momentarily uncomfortable. “I don’t drink.” He must’ve seen Steve’s expression, because he added, quickly, “ _Don’t_ apologise.”

“Let’s dance, then,” Steve decided. He was pretty sure the music was for a waltz. It looked like a waltz. He could handle that much. Probably. Maybe.

Anthony tilted his head. “Have I lost the real Steve Rogers on the way?” he asked, amused.

“You could show me the steps,” Steve fumbled. “But slowly.”

Anthony’s gaze was heated. “I never intended to be _quick_.”

Steve took his hand and let himself be led to the side of the room, away from the main crowd. Anthony directed Steve’s left hand to his own right shoulder and slid his hand around to Steve’s back, under his arm. He held out his own left hand expectantly and Steve took it, already feeling foolish. The feeling was somewhat offset by the scant space between them and the intensity of Anthony’s eyes.

“Step back first, with your right foot,” Anthony said, his voice low and soft. “Two steps back, two to your right. Slow, slow, quick-quick. Then in reverse, you step forward and to the right again.”

Right. Not a waltz then. Steve swallowed back a nervous comment and nodded. The guiding pressure of Anthony’s hands was firm but reassuring, the cool grip of his fingers a welcome contrast to the hot cramped air of the dance floor. They stepped out. Slow, slow, quick-quick; slow, slow—

“Look at _me_ , Steve,” Anthony said. Steve jerked his head up. Looking in Anthony’s eyes, he almost forgot how stressed he was about getting the steps right. He focused on Anthony and his closeness, long lashes casting shadows at his cheeks and tried not to worry about dancing. Somehow, not _thinking_ about moving, just _moving_ , worked way better.

He still stumbled twice, but by the time the band brought the song to a close he thought he was maybe getting the hang of it. And there were some definite perks, like Anthony’s hand rubbing soothing circles on his back now that they finished the dance.

“Not the worst I’ve seen,” Anthony drawled. “Shall we try another?” 

The unmistakable beat of a swing tune started, and given Anthony’s amused expression Steve had to assume some of his panic showed on his face.

“You’d be good at this, if you learned it,” Anthony said. He stroked his right hand down Steve’s back and up again like a promise. “You have the strength and flexibility.”

Steve stumbled into him. He stepped back quickly, because no matter how much he wanted to be _close_ to Anthony and maybe run his hands under his shirt and make him lose his composure, they were in public. Steve had to remember that. 

“Sorry, sorry. Can we . . . not?” There were _lifts_ in swing. And lots of turns and twirls. And it was so fast he would almost certainly trip over his own feet and send them both sprawling to the floor.

Anthony eyed him for a moment.

“And what do you propose instead?”

“I just want to be close to you,” Steve admitted. “ _With_ you.” That was maybe more than he wanted to say, but he couldn’t bring himself to regret it.

Anthony hummed under his breath and then led Steve further to the edge of the dance floor, to a darker corner. There he again directed Steve’s hands, though he settled his own right hand lower on Steve’s back, over his ribs instead of his shoulder blade.

They stood closer, too, swaying gently as if to some music inside Anthony’s head.

“I have to say,” Steve drawled lazily some moments later, “that I was surprised when you kissed me for the first time.”

Anthony seemed taken aback. “What, really?” he asked. “I thought sharing your literature was a come-on. Is that out of fashion now?”

“I tend to get my books at the library, but I have no idea what happens there after dark,” Steve told him drily, and Anthony laughed, pressing his face into Steve’s shoulder to mute the sound.

“I’ve heard a lot of things went down in the Constantinople one,” he whispered straight into Steve’s ear, his cold breath causing Steve to shiver.

Around them couples swirled in dance, but Steve and Anthony stayed pressed against each other, just swinging to their own rhythm.

“I could draw you sometime,” Steve offered.

Anthony looked at him with big, dark eyes. “Now _that_ ,” he said, “is definitely a come-on.” He considered. “And a way to get me out of my clothes, probably. How positively scandalous, Captain America.”

“I didn’t say anything of the sort,” Steve countered mildly, “but if you’re offering, who am I to disagree?”

“Of course,” Anthony said. “I can’t draw, but you gave me this idea just now that maybe I should make you a new uniform. I’m not sure the current one was correctly measured.”

Apparently it _was_ possible to step on your partner’s feet when hardly moving in his embrace, as Steve had just proved.

“Sorry,” he said, his face burning.

“Not at all,” Anthony said. “They’ve started a waltz, you know. Always better to match your dance to the music.”

“Pretty sure I just proved I can’t handle that,” Steve argued.

“Nonsense. You did just fine at the foxtrot.” Anthony waved his concerns off, moving back toward the dance floor proper and offering Steve his hand. “Trust me. I’ll lead.”

There was really nothing Steve could say to that, so he accepted Anthony’s hand and assumed the dance pose again. Anthony smiled at him.

“Make sure you look at _me_ , not your feet,” he said, and he started moving. Somehow, after their recent closeness, Steve found that his body could follow all the subtle cues of Anthony’s. Dancing wasn’t unlike fighting: both were about understanding the other person’s movements. The air between them was electric, and Steve felt a sense of loss when the song ended.

“How was that one?” Anthony asked.

“Maybe coming here wasn’t such a bad idea,” Steve answered, already leaning in. The fact that they were on the date, the flirting, Anthony’s body so close to his, even if separated by all the many layers of their clothing . . .

“High praise,” Anthony commented before their lips connected in a chase kiss. Steve wanted to make it last, but he moved away when he felt Anthony start to reciprocate. 

“Tease,” Anthony told him.

“Hey, you wanted to go out in public,” Steve reminded him with a beatific smile.

“I didn’t realise how evil you are. Another foxtrot?”

Steve nodded. He’d never actually let Anthony’s hand go, so they smoothly started moving again. It was easier, this time. Steve learnt anything physical much more quickly now, thanks to the serum, and the steps already turned familiar. Only Anthony’s grin warned him before the man twirled him around, catching him around the waist seconds later.

“I can’t let you get bored,” Anthony explained.

“With you?” Steve raised a sceptical eyebrow. “Never.”

Anthony’s expression turned unbearably soft for a moment, so Steve squeezed his hand reassuringly. He got a brilliant smile in reward. 

They didn’t touch a drop to alcohol, but both returned to the base drunk on endorphins.

***

 _Now_ :

“So, first time in Savage Land,” Iron Man says, not turning from steering the quinjet. “I’d say you should hope it’ll be your last, too, but we’re never that lucky.”

“I don’t know, seeing dinosaurs doesn’t sound that bad,” Steve jokes.

“Dinosaurs that feed on too-nice-for-their-own-good superheroes,” Iron Man corrects him. “Speaking of, thank you for coming.”

Steve rolls his eyes. “You’re my friend. Of course I’m coming.”

“It’s not Avengers business,” Iron Man insists.

“And that changes what?” Steve asks. “You know the others would be here if they could.” But Hank’s sick, and Jan has an important fashion show. She was ready to drop it, but both Iron Man and Steve insisted they could handle this. It’s not an emergency situation bringing them to Savage Land, just a crashed Stark satellite full of tech that Mister Stark worries about.

“Thanks anyway,” Iron Man repeats, and Steve knows this time he’s doing it just to mess with him.

“You’re very welcome,” he replies in his best serious voice.

Iron Man laughs. It’s cut short by one of the flight instruments beeping. “Damn. Hold on tight, Cap, landing here is always—”

Steve’s strapped in, but he fits his arms against his body anyway. There’s a gush of wind strong enough to shake the Quinjet, and Iron Man curses. They spin around, once, twice, and Steve’s dizzy when something hits the side of the jet—

There’s smoke in the air. He opens his eyes to see the front shield broken into pebbles and squares of safety glass. He experimentally moves his head to the left and then to the right, but he feels no pain. The quinjet might have taken a lot of damage, but it clearly has kept the passengers safe. Steve unfastens his seatbelt and looks at Iron Man.

“Are you all right?”

Iron Man makes a strangled noise. Steve frowns. The armour seems undamaged, but there’s no saying how the man inside fares. 

“’m fine,” Iron Man mutters finally. There’s a pause which Steve assumes just means he’s checking his systems. “And the armour, more or less.”

“How’s the quinjet?”

“Don’t ask,” Iron Man groans. “Let’s get out of here before it explodes, not that that should happen but _fucking Savage Land_ , and then we can talk.”

He stands up, a bit unsteady in the upturned jet, and Steve follows suit. Iron Man sighs and activates his repulsors, hovering just a few inches over the floor. “Here, let me,” he says, moving towards Steve. “I’ll haul you out through this window, okay, it’ll be easier.”

He doesn’t wait for Steve’s answer as he catches him under his armpits and flies backward, carefully shielding Steve from the cracked edges of what used to be the front panelling. Steve tries to hold still until Iron Man sets them both down on the ground outside.

Then Steve looks around. “ _Wow_ ,” he says, because he’s supposed to be in Antarctica, and yet he’s surrounded by giant trees the kinds of which he’s never seen before.

“Well, I’m glad you like the sights,” Iron Man says, “because this won’t fly any time soon.” He curses again. “Aaaand the medbay compartment got crushed.”

“Let’s hope we won’t need it, then,” Steve says.

“Let’s,” Iron Man agrees, but he sounds like he’s on edge. “It’ll take me at least a day to fix it. Maybe we should just do that and head back. The satellite is not that important.”

Steve gives him an incredulous look. “We’re already here,” he says. “We should find it.”

“I suppose,” Iron Man says, then pauses. “You’ll need food.”

“And you’re planning on starving?” Steve asks.

Iron Man huffs a laugh. “Do stand back. I’ll try to get the rations out. I don’t want the quinjet to tip and fall on you.”

Steve obediently moves further away. He looks around while he’s waiting. He can hear animals moving in the forest around them, and he’s almost sure some of the birds over his head are too big and not feathery enough to be actual birds. He knew to expect dinosaurs, but the reality of having pterodactyls flying in the sky is something else entirely. He also knows it’d be preferable not to get up close and personal with any of the creatures living in Savage Land, no matter how fascinating they might be.

Iron Man returns, carrying a backpack that looks hilarious in his armoured hands.

“So, you’re a pilot—and a mechanic, too?” Steve asks.

“You could say that,” Iron Man mutters. He turns around in a circle, slowly, and then points ahead of himself. “This way.”

Armour computer, Steve assumes, and follows Iron Man into the prehistoric jungle.

***

It goes okay, at first. They trek through the jungle for several hours following the signal, with Iron Man occasionally cursing the Savage Land’s magnetic fields deterring them from landing more safely _and_ closer. Steve can hear the dinosaurs roaring, sometimes way too close, but nothing attacks them. 

“I wonder when our luck will run out,” Iron Man says, and Steve shushes him.

“Don’t tempt fate.”

Iron Man tilts his head. “Don’t worry, Cap, I’ll protect you from monsters.”

“Not if I protect you first,” Steve tells him, and Iron Man shakes his head, amused.

“It’s getting dark,” Steve notes some time later.

“Looks like,” Iron Man agrees. He turns back to look at Steve. “Are you okay to go on? We’re almost there, but we’ll need to stop for the night anyway.”

“Let’s stop,” Steve says. He’s not that tired yet, but Iron Man is only human. Steve doesn’t want him to push himself beyond his limits. “It’ll be easier if you have daylight to tinker with the satellite, right.”

Iron Man shrugs. “I’m okay either way.”

“Okay.” Steve stops. “Let’s spend the night here, then, no point in walking at night when we don’t have to.”

They don’t have sleeping bags, but Steve’s slept in worse conditions during the war. He catches the energy bar Iron Man throws him and raises an eyebrow. “Are you gonna sleep in the armour?”

“Yes,” Iron Man says. His tone is clear: _don’t push_. Steve sighs, but he accepts it. “I’ll take the first watch,” Iron Man tells him. “Eat and get some rest, Steve.”

Of course, he clearly can’t eat either while Steve’s there, staring at him. Steve sighs. He _doesn’t_ mind not knowing Iron Man’s identity, he really doesn’t. But sometimes it would be just so much easier if Iron Man could shed the armour around him. _It doesn’t mean he doesn’t trust you_ , Steve tells himself, but a small voice at the back of his head says, _It means exactly that. Don’t lie to yourself_.

Annoyed at his own thoughts, Steve lies down on the ground. “Wake me up when it’s my turn,” he says.

“I will,” Iron Man answers. “Sweet dreams, Captain.”

Steve doesn’t dream this night.

Iron Man wakes him up at some point—closer to the sunrise than Steve would like, considering his teammate needs rest, too—and Steve keeps watch for the remaining few hours. In the morning without any hustle. Steve turns his back and tells Iron Man to eat something for breakfast. Then they set out without any hustle.

The part of the satellite they’re there to retrieve is smaller than Steve expected, barely bigger than his tablet, but that’s good—there won’t be any issues carrying it back.

Iron Man shakes his head, looking at it. “It didn’t burn up on re-entry,” he musters. “Which _is_ good, really, means this material is working like it should.”

“But it also means we had to come here and get it,” Steve finishes his thought.

“Yeah.” Iron Man shrugs one shoulder. “Well, that’s done, we can head back now and worry about fixing our jet.” He puts the part in the bag holding all their food.

“As far as Avengers trips go, this hasn’t been the worst,” Steve comments.

Iron Man glares at him. “Didn’t you tell me not to tempt the fate like that?” he asks, scandalised, and Steve can’t help but laugh at his voice.

They walk, taking several breaks, until the sky starts to darken again. However, Steve’s been watching Iron Man for some time with increasing concern. He’s tripped a few times, and when they paused for some rest he sat completely still like a statue; Steve had needed to raise his voice to get his attention.

“Listen,” he says, when Iron Man looks around as if he’s disoriented, “We can just camp out for the night again.”

“More time here is the last thing I need,” Iron Man says, and he sounds stressed. “Besides, the quinjet is—” 

He’s interrupted by a roar coming from _way too close._ Steve spins around raising his shield just in time to block a giant claw.

“Of _course_ it’s ten minutes away from the jet,” Iron Man complains, firing his repulsors to Steve’s left. The creature attacking them is various shades of green, no doubt the perfect camouflage in the jungle, big and _fast_. Steve can’t identify it, if it even is a real dinosaur and not a product of whatever’s going on in Savage Land. It rears its head and opens its mouth.

“Duck!” Iron Man yells, and Steve obeys instinctively, rolling away. 

There’s a puddle of acid where Steve stood just a second ago, hissing as it eats through the grass. “ _Now_ I understand why you hate coming here,” Steve says, throwing the shield at the creature’s head as Iron Man fires his repulsors in a constant beam.

Steve doesn’t notice the creature has a long tail until it’s too late. Something hits him in the side, hard, and throws him back; he hits a tree with his back and for a few moments everything goes dark.

***

When he comes to, the creature isn’t moving anymore. Iron Man stands next to it, his hand still extended but his weapons powered down. Steve swallows as he sees what’s left of the creature’s head. The armour would be really dangerous in the wrong hands.

“Are you okay?” Iron Man asks. 

“Yeah.” Steve stands up slowly. He’s dizzy for a moment, but he regains his balance immediately, and then he feels something wet and warm on the side of his face. He feels around, and sure enough, his cowl is ripped and there’s a wound on the side of his head. It doesn’t seem deep, but it’s bleeding like head wounds are prone to do.

“You should get that wrapped,” Iron Man says in a weird, stilted voice, not moving from where he’s standing.

Steve frowns, looking him over, and swears. “He got you.”

Iron Man tilts his head as if surprised, and Steve gestures at his own hand. Iron Man looks down at his side. “So he did,” he agrees, far too calm about it.

Steve steps towards him. “Iron Man,” he says, urgently, heedless of his own injuries, the pain in his side growing worse as he moves, “Take your gauntlet off.”

Iron Man doesn’t move. He stands, his head slightly leaning down and to the left, looking at his left hand. The gauntlet that’s covered in acid. Steve _knows_ it has to be eating through, tough metal or not. A few more moments, and it'll hurt Iron Man. Maybe it already has.

“Iron Man!”

Iron Man moves, finally, but not the way Steve wanted. He takes a step away from Steve, and even in the armour it seems unsteady.

“Take it off,” Steve says again, sharp like the order it is.

“It doesn't matter,” Iron Man says quietly.

“What?” Steve looks at him angrily. “It'll hurt you!”

“It doesn't matter,” Iron Man repeats. He’s very still now. The sun reflecting on the gold parts of the armour hurts Steve's eyes, but he doesn’t look away.

“Take. It. Off.” What is Iron Man waiting for? If he doesn’t do anything, the acid can really damage his hand. “Take it off or _I'll_ take it off you.”

Iron Man laughs. It sounds eerily inhuman through the armour filters, but Steve had learnt to recognise the sound a long time ago. “I'd like to see you try,” Iron Man says, so quietly Steve’s sure he imagined it. He looks around then. “We’re trapped here. No other humans but you.”

“All the more reason for you to listen to me,” Steve insists, ignoring for the time being how Iron Man said _humans_. It’s important—he doesn’t know how or why, he just knows it is—but it’s not as important as the prospect that he might get hurt. There’s a sound, like Iron Man sucking in a pained breath.

“Take it off!” Steve yells.

Steve doesn’t know what changed, but Iron Man does listen this time. He turns his back to the sun, fiddles at the gauntlet, lets it fall to the ground. He cradles his injured hand against his chest. Steve watches as if hypnotized. He'd always known there was a man under the armour, but now—

Seeing his hand, long, elegant fingers, carefully trimmed nails—

 _No injury at all_ , Steve can’t help but notice, and he'd breath with relief, but something’s still wrong, and Iron Man isn’t moving, not at all; is he hiding the hurt parts of his palm?

Steve steps to him, quickly grabs him by his wrist and pulls the bared hand towards him.

It seems all right—

The moment it’s out of the shadow thrown by Iron Man himself, the hand turns red, as if burnt, and he stumbles back from Steve, and back, and back—

“I'm sorry,” Steve says. “Sorry, I, I just wanted to see if you're all right—”

But he _was_. As long as his hand stayed hidden in the shadow.

Steve knew the answer to this equation, at some point, and he can’t find it now.

“Are you—”

“Stay back.” Iron Man extends his healthy, still gauntleted hand. He keeps his arm perfectly steady as he aims the repulsor straight at Steve.

Steve raises his hands in surrender. “What’s going on here, Iron Man?”

“You’re _hurt_ ,” Iron Man says. It doesn’t sound like he’s worried. It sounds like a warning, or a threat.

“I’m worried,” Steve corrects.

“And _hurt_ ,” Iron Man repeats. “You have a bleeding head wound, and my armour isn't hermetic anymore, and— _AB positive, Captain, isn't it? Delicious_.” 

Steve steps back.

Iron Man doesn’t say anything more, his bare hand once again pressed against his chest, his other one raised high, aiming at Steve. It’s not what forces Steve to move away. His voice is, even through the filters. It’s _dangerous_. And it doesn’t make any sense: Iron Man is a friend, his best friend; he'd never hurt Steve—

And yet, Steve is _afraid_ , and he isn’t even sure of what. He trusts Iron Man with his life, but . . . He’s forced to admit, _not at this moment_.

The sun is still visible in the sky but Steve feels a bit like it’s the middle of the night, the time when humans are supposed to be inside their homes, safe behind closed doors, secure with the knowledge they haven’t invited anyone in; like it’s dark and it’s the time of predators and not mere people.

Steve backs off, step after step. There’s—something—a barely remembered memory at the back of his head, red eyes glowing in the dark—everything goes blurry for one terrible second. He wonders if he’s got a concussion. Iron Man advances on him in slow, rigid steps, as if something’s making him move against his will. He’s still cradling his hand against his chest, and Steve knows logically that he’s hurt and he needs help, whatever that help would look like, but he’s terrified. There’s fear coursing through his whole body, the kind of which he hasn’t felt since—maybe ever.

“You should really stay in the sun, Captain,” Iron Man tells him when he briefly steps into the shadow of a tall tree, “Although that really doesn’t seem like it will be possible much longer. Pity, eh?”

Steve isn’t sure why, but he walks back into sunlight immediately, looks up and curses. It’s already dusk. He wonders if he can find a shelter—fire, he needs fire—and shakes his head wildly. Where are these thoughts coming from? He’s _better_ than this. His teammate needs help.

“What’s going on, Iron Man?” he asks, lacing his voice with worry. _Be reasonable_ , he tells himself. His instincts have never let him down, but there’s no point in being suspicious and uncomfortable in the presence of the one person he can trust.

It’s weirdly quiet around them all of a sudden, a maddening, deafening silence, all the more scary for the fact that the Savage Land is _never_ silent.

A part of Steve wants to hide between the trees; a bigger part tells him to stay in the clearing, start a fire while Iron Man still has some semblance of control: over what, Steve doesn’t know.

And then, the sunlight is gone.

Darkness creeps over them both and Iron Man straightens suddenly, letting his hand fall to his side. He tilts his head left and right, as if to get cricks out of his neck, and laughs. “Isn’t this nice?” he says in a fake cheerful tone.

“Iron Man! This isn’t you!” Steve yells, even as he’s growing aware that no: this _is_ Iron Man. The man that Steve knows is the mask, a perfect lie that put him at ease when he never should’ve trusted it.

Steve raises his shield protectively. Iron Man only laughs. “Priceless as it might be,” he drawls, “it’s not made of silver.”

Steve holds it tighter. He doesn’t want to attack another Avenger, and more than that he doesn’t want to stay completely defenceless when he lets the shield fly.

“ _Run_ ,” Iron Man snaps, and Steve does, turns back and runs as fast as he can.

It’s not a conscious decision. The word has barely sounded in the air when his legs start moving, carrying him away, as far as he can get, just _running_ , thoughtlessly running, fast, with no thought given to conserving his energy, running and running and—

“I guess you tried.”

Steve stops dead. He knows this voice very well—

No, no he doesn’t, the accent is all wrong; it’s Tony Stark’s voice, not Anthony’s as he thought, but . . .

There’s a man in front of him.

He doesn’t wear the armour anymore, but Steve knows he’s looking at Iron Man all the same. Iron Man, Tony Stark, same person; of _fucking_ course, clearly it runs in the family—except Anthony told him the truth and this man didn’t extend him even that much courtesy.

He’s wearing a thin black undersuit and he’s standing very still, not even moving, and his eyes are glowing red in the darkness and Steve really should’ve noticed that part before anything else. He’s grinning and it’s utterly inhuman, his fangs too long and too sharp.

 _Vampires aren’t real_.

“Again?” Tony Stark mutters, and apparently Steve spoke out loud, and nothing makes any sense at all except for how there’s something Steve _doesn’t remember_. 

He’s been here before, in a forest with a man that’s no human at all. 

“Who are you,” he says.

Stark opens his mouth, as if to answer, but then he looks just slightly to the right of Steve’s eyes, and suddenly Steve’s very, very aware of the blood clinging to his skin, of the bleeding wound on his forehead.

“I—” Stark forces out, looking scared for the briefest second. 

Then he’s on Steve, so fast Steve didn’t have a chance to noticehim moving at all, his arm wrapped around Steve’s waist impossibly familiar; the way he grabs Steve’s head and forces it to the side something else entirely. 

Steve tries to fight his hold and can’t; it’s like trying to break reinforced chains.

Cold lips brush against his neck and this too is familiar: the first kiss he’d ever shared with Anthony is an uncomfortable memory right now.

Then there’s pain, two pinpricks in his neck. A foreign sensation overcomes him, a weakness that comes from blood loss enhanced a million times, and a weird, upsetting feeling telling him he should _calm down_. He wants to fight, but he’s forgetting why and he slumps in Anthony’s arms, edging closer to unconsciousness—

Everything stops.

He’s very gently lowered to the ground. The pain in his neck is a distant memory. He eyes are closing, but there’s something—something important, something he _can’t_ lose again.

“Anthony,” he lets out.

Silence.

“You’re Anthony,” he repeats.

“I’m sorry, Steve.” Steve knows this voice and he knows this accent and he knows this man, and it’s impossible, terrific and terrifying, and there are too many things to consider that Steve doesn’t have energy for—he’s barely awake, he knows he’ll black out any moment now, blood loss and shock and . . . He needs to . . .

“ _Stay_ ,” he orders.

A cold, cold hand takes his, colder fingers find his pulse point. Steve wants to look at him, but his eyes remain unfocused. He wants to tighten his fingers, as if holding his hand harder will stop Anthony from leaving, and he can’t move. 

Distantly, he realises his calm is anything but natural. Distantly, he realises he’s angry. Distantly, he hates Anthony.

Here and now, none of these things matter. Here and now, he’s almost safe. Here and now, it’s like his dreams have come true.

Here and now, Steve slips into unconsciousness.

***

 _Then_ :

There was a full moon in the night sky, making patrolling that night easy. Steve briefly wondered whether Anthony would surprise him again as he left the base and started walking the perimeter. He was in a good mood: yesterday’s date with Anthony had been really nice, and hopefully it wouldn’t be the last: they were both of them transferring to another base together. He walked with a spring in his step, content and smiling as if it wasn’t the middle of a war.

The first thing he noticed were two red points in the darkness.

He grabbed his shield and froze, hand extended, the last moment when he could stop himself from throwing the shield, because the view came into focus, and it was Anthony standing in front of him.

Anthony, even paler than usual in the moonlight, his eyes glowing bright red, looking at Steve with something between panic and sad resignation, his lips crimson.

There was a dull thudding sound and Steve looked down from Anthony’s face to the ground: a man in a Nazi uniform lay prone, unmoving. His shirt was stained with blood, and as he looked, Steve understood why: the man had been bleeding from the neck. Steve didn’t need to kneel and check to know that he was dead. He looked back up.

Anthony hadn’t moved.

Steve recoiled.

“Steve,” Anthony said, and Steve noticed for the first time how sharp his teeth were. _Fangs_ , he thought, because of course, it all made sense now—

His inhumanly good night vision. The way he could walk soundlessly. How he was amused every time Steve worried about him. His icy cold skin. How Steve had never ever seen him outside in sunlight. How he wouldn’t eat.

And the weird hunger with which he’d looked at Steve.

 _Vampires aren’t real_.

“And supersoldiers are?” Anthony asked with a raised eyebrow, and only then did Steve realise he’d spoken out loud.

This was wrong. All of this was wrong. Anthony was _a good man_.

Steve looked down again.

Good men didn’t do this.

Feeling his heart breaking, he threw the shield.

Anthony caught it effortlessly, moving faster than Steve could see. “If I hand it back to you, will you attack me again?” he asked quietly.

“ _Yes_ ,” Steve snarled.

“You can’t fight me.” He said it like it was a fact, indisputable and obvious. “You certainly can’t kill me. Talk to me.”

“Were you planning to bite me too?” Steve snapped.

“ _Never_.”

“Liar!”

Anthony flinched. “I may have kept some things hidden—your present reaction is the best explanation for why. I have never lied to you.”

Steve had kissed him. Steve had trusted him. Steve had _fallen in love_ with him. And all this time, Anthony was . . . 

No more, Steve thought.

He threw himself bodily at Anthony. He didn’t have his shield, but that didn’t mean he was harmless. Anthony neatly sidestepped him, still holding his shield at his side.

“Fight me!” Steve yelled.

Anthony tilted his head like cat watching a mouse.

“You really should listen to me,” he said.

Steve shook his head. Anthony dropped the shield.

The next thing Steve knew, he was being held against the tree, Anthony’s hand at his throat.

“Monster,” Steve hissed. Anthony closed his eyes briefly, as if in pain, but his grip never loosened.

“ _Look at me_ ,” he ordered in a low, irresistible voice, opening his eyes again. Steve’s whole body relaxed at the sound of it. He looked into Anthony’s eyes, the wonderful red of his irises, decidedly inhuman yet fascinating, deep, no—bottomless.

“I love you,” Anthony whispered. “I never wanted this to happen.”

Steve couldn’t focus on the meaning behind his words, just the melodic tones of Anthony speaking. It was _important_ , he knew as much, but he didn’t know why. Anthony sounded pained, and Steve hated it. He’d do anything to help, if only Anthony told him what . . . 

“You didn’t see me tonight,” Anthony said with intent. “You don’t know what I am.”

Steve’s vision was swimming, Anthony’s face going blurry.

“The perimeter is clear,” Anthony continued. “You’ll go back to the base.”

Of course he would. His patrol was done, what else would Steve do but return?

“You never received orders to transfer with Iron Man,” Anthony added. “You’ll be going alone.”

Steve didn’t look forward to that. He’d hoped Anthony could go with him, but the Major had been very clear today that it was an assignment for Captain America only.

Anthony chuckled; it sounded almost like a sob. “I should tell you to forget me,” he said, his voice breaking, “but somehow I can’t bring myself to do it. I’m too selfish, I suppose.”

He pressed his lips to Steve’s in a chaste kiss, and then he covered Steve’s eyes with his hand.

Steve opened his eyes. He was almost at the patrol change point. He yawned as he walked to it. His patrol tonight had been uneventful. His shield was secured at his back; he never even had to touch it tonight. It was a good thing, of course—no one wanted German spies nearby—but it was late at night and he was looking forward to his bed. Tomorrow would be his last day at the base. He hoped to spend it with Anthony. They hadn’t gotten to see each other today and Steve missed him horribly.

He fell asleep as soon as his head touched the pillow. He dreamt of red eyes and cold hands covering his face, but when he woke up, he forgot it all.

Anthony was nowhere to be found on base and so, fighting disappointment, Steve tore off a page from his sketchbook. He couldn’t find any words—or he could find _too_ many, none of which he would trust to the paper.

Finally, he wrote simply, _Take care while I’m gone. Love, Steve_. He folded it carefully and went to leave it at Anthony’s desk in the hangar.

He had the uncanny feeling of being watched as he went inside, but he looked around and didn’t see anyone, so he just shrugged. He was constantly on a high alert these days. His body didn’t really understand that he could wind down at the base.

The next morning, he set out alone. Anthony didn’t bid him farewell.

(A week after, he crashed his plane in the Arctic, the ice around him as cold as Anthony’s embrace.)

***

 _Now_ :

He wakes up with a jolt. Someone pushes him back down, strong enough that Steve can’t fight it. He’s hurting all over and his memory is fuzzy at best. Savage Land, he remembers, and Iron Man, and . . .

“You’ll get dizzy,” a voice says in a perfect British accent, and Steve _remembers_.

“Let go of me,” he snarls. The hand at his shoulder recedes.

“Please stay down,” Anthony says quietly. “You—” he hesitates “—lost quite a lot of blood.”

“ _Lost_ ,” Steve quotes, sitting up. A wave of nausea sends him back down, and he props himself up with his elbow, breathing hard, trying not to retch. 

Slowly, he takes account of his surroundings. They’re in a cave, for one thing: narrow and humid. Steve’s lying on a makeshift mattress made out of giant leaves. He can see the entrance and the beautiful, brilliant sunlight just outside. For a moment, he wants nothing more than to get up and run and get to safety.

But it’s not really safe, is it? Anthony can just put on the armour: it’s lying right next to him.

There’s a fire going, too, probably a courtesy to Steve, as he knows full well now that Anthony doesn’t need either light or warmth.

 _Anthony_.

“You let me think you were dead!” Steve yells. It’s not a conversation he wants to have while too weak to stand up, but it’s also not something that can wait until he feels better.

Anthony sighs quietly. Steve wonders how he could’ve ever believed Tony Stark was a different person. “I _am_ sorry,” he says.

“Why?” Steve whispers. “Why did you lie?”

Anthony chuckles, not amused. “Is this really a question?” he asks. “Where do I even _start_?”

“At the beginning,” Steve snaps.

Anthony leans back against the cave wall, and he seems tired and ancient in the flickering light of the fire. “The beginning,” he repeats. “That’s too long ago.” He falls silent for a while, fiddling with his fingers. “It was a mistake, Steve. All of it. I never should’ve let myself get close to you. But there was a war on, like I’d never seen before, and—”

“And what, you got freaked out by the bloodshed?” Steve cuts in, angry.

“As a matter of fact,” Anthony says in an icy voice, “I did. And I _liked_ you, and, well, you know that part.”

“You could’ve told me!” Why hadn’t he trusted Steve? Why had Steve never _noticed_? Why was he focusing on this and not that part where _Anthony was a vampire?_

“I really don’t think I could’ve,” Anthony says, staring at the wall. “But then, I have so many apologies to make already.” He looks at Steve, and his eyes go red again. Steve backs away, but he’s too slow: Anthony’s gaze catches him and holds. “ _Remember_ ,” Anthony says, and it’s like a bucket of cold water thrown over Steve.

A patrol in a moonlight. Red eyes in the forest. A German spy with no blood left in his veins. Anthony, with blood on his lips. A fight, and a confession, _I love you_ , and an order, _Forget_.

Another lie. Another betrayal. 

A moment ago, Steve was sure he was too weak to move, but he finds strength now: he gets up, shaking all over, and lands a blow square on Anthony’s jaw.

He’d thought it would help, but he is painfully aware Anthony let him hit him, and it only makes him feel worse. He’s cut Anthony’s lip, and as Steve watches, Anthony’s tongue darts off to lick a drop of blood; a second later the small wound closes like it was never there.

Steve shuffles away, closer to the sunlight, not really sure what the point is: he can’t fight Anthony off even fully rested.

“See,” Anthony says after a long moment. “I knew how you’d react.”

“You didn’t,” Steve interrupts. “You _don’t_ know how I feel, you don’t fucking know better than I do, you don’t—”

“Steve—”

“Let me talk!” Steve breathes heavily. He lowers himself to the ground before he can fall down. “You _bit_ _me_ , you _wiped my mind_ , you’re a vampire—a monster—”

Anthony recoils.

“And I don’t know how to _talk_ to you—but here I am, _talking_ , because at the very least it means you’re not dead!” Steve’s yelling at the end.

Anthony’s staring at him, uncomprehending.

“And it _doesn’t_ make anything okay,” Steve adds. “I’m not—I haven’t forgiven you.”

“I know.” Anthony worries at his lower lip for a bit. “This is why,” he says finally. “More than anything—I didn’t want you burdened like this. I didn’t want you—destroyed by me. By what I am.”

“So it was for my own good, yes?” Steve’s fighting the urge to shake him, or better yet punch him again, make him _see_. 

Anthony shrugs. “I hoped you would find things to love in twenty-first century.” He huffs a laugh. “It’s one of the best I’ve seen.”

Best _centuries_. Because he is an immortal vampire. And now he won’t stop reminding Steve, apparently. 

Steve needs to think, away from him, but that’s impossible at the moment, so he focuses on the next thing.

 _I love you_ , Anthony had said, almost eighty years ago. Did he really? Does he still?

Does it even matter?

Steve doesn’t ask out loud. 

He touches his neck, patting his fingers around until he feels two small wounds, already healing. Anthony watches him, silently. His eyes are blue again. He looks human. He could kill Steve in seconds. He almost did.

“You _bit me_ ,” Steve says, because there’s no avoiding this topic.

“It won’t happen again.” 

“Do you expect me to believe that?” Steve mocks.

Anthony smiles slightly. “You do, though. I’ve no idea why—God knows I’ve done nothing to deserve it—but you do. You haven’t even moved to sit in the sunlight.”

“You have the armour,” Steve reminds him. _And I’m not sure I could make it these 10 steps right now_.

“So I do.” Anthony rubs his eyes. “I was starving,” he says finally. “We’ve been here 2 days. I never let myself go that long without.” He doesn’t say without _what_ , as if Steve was still holding any illusions. “I was hurt, and you were hurt too, and bleeding.” He looks very uncomfortable. “It’s not an excuse. But I very much doubt this situation will repeat itself.”

“So normally . . .”

“Blood bags,” Anthony cuts in quickly.

Blood bags, Steve thinks. That’s convenient, in twenty-first century. And rather impossible one hundred years ago.

Anthony’s looking at him like he’s daring him to ask.

“Okay,” Steve says, because the last thing he wants now is to do what Anthony’s expecting from him. Anthony stays completely still, seemingly not even breathing, looking at Steve, clearly _waiting_.

Steve turns away from him.

“If you want to hurt me,” Anthony says, barely above a whisper, in a clinical, emotionless voice, “then fire will do the trick.”

Steve’s happy Anthony can’t see his expression at the moment, because his brain stutters to a halt, and he just can’t comprehend Anthony’s words. Or actions, because if Anthony’s sensitive to fire, then _why the hell did he start one in the cave_?

“I am not a monster,” Steve says finally through clenched teeth, without looking back. “And if I had the means to extinguish this fire immediately, then I’d do it right this second.”

There’s no answer.

After a moment, he hears Anthony moving, and he’s annoyed even at that: he knows the man can walk silently and he’s only making a noise for Steve’s sake now. He turns to glare at him, and sees Anthony offering him the energy bars Steve now knows all too well he doesn’t need. 

So many things make sense in retrospect; he wonders how he could’ve been so blind.

“You should eat,” Anthony says, the guilt in his voice unmistakable. He passes Steve a water bottle, too, and then stares, transfixed, as Steve drinks. Steve would rather like a scarf or ten to cover his neck with, right now. A silver neck guard. Anything. Something to protect himself, not to attack.

 _Sun, fire, and silver_ , Steve catalogues, and pretends he doesn’t feel sick that Anthony told him how to injure him. Worse still, that a part of him _does_ want to know.

“We’re still close to the jet,” Anthony tells him as Steve eats. “I did start on fixing it before the sunrise, but I can’t really continue during the day without my gauntlet.” He flexes the fingers of his left hand. Steve swallows down the rest of the energy bar and has a brief internal fight with himself. Sighing, he reaches out and grabs Anthony’s wrist.

Anthony looks at him sharply but doesn’t pull away, making Steve wonder if he’s just going to go with whatever Steve wants to do at the moment to appease his guilt. Steve looks at his hand, the long, elegant fingers startlingly pale against the blackness of his undersuit. He got burnt by sun yesterday, Steve knows, and yet there isn’t even any redness to prove it. He’d built his own armour, has been working on it for years, and his skin is as smooth as if he’s never done any kind of physical work whatsoever.

“Are you looking for scars?” Anthony asks finally. “You won’t find any.”

“I saw you get hurt in the sun.”

Anthony leans his head back against the wall, tired. “I was. And burns don’t heal easily on me. But the sun only touched me for a second, and then I drank your blood. You won’t find scars on me, Steve, not any I’ve acquired after becoming a vampire.”

Steve shakes his head in disbelief. This kind of power is impossible to imagine. Inhuman.

Anthony gently peels Steve’s fingers away from his wrist; Steve hadn’t realised he’d kept holding him. 

“I hate to ask this,” Anthony speaks, “but I am actually a nocturnal creature. Unless you have more questions, would you mind if I slept until sunset?”

Steve shakes his head, distancing himself from Anthony again. “Go ahead.”

Anthony nods his head, as if in thanks, and closes his eyes. He doesn’t lie down on the ground, he stays sitting, his legs outstretched, completely, terrifyingly still. He really isn’t breathing, Steve observes, and he thinks that if he were to touch Anthony’s pulse point, he wouldn’t find anything. 

He _is_ a vampire. He is dead.

But knowing it and seeing it are two different things, and Steve _doesn’t_ _like seeing it_.

***

Steve’s mostly recovered his energy—he does heal fast, if not vampire-fast—when they go back to the quinjet, but Anthony clearly doesn’t need his help for the repairs. The quinjet is standing on the ground, not upturned, as if they managed to land safely; Anthony must’ve moved it the previous night. He sets his armour down, pulls a toolbox out from underneath the quinjet, and unscrews the side panel.

Steve sits down, settling to watch him work. He doesn’t have a book, but the situation is almost familiar: watching Anthony work in silence, completely focused on what he’s doing.

Of course, some things are _very_ different.

Steve’s seen Anthony in many different clothes, usually looking straight from another century—and now he knows why—and he’s always been covered by too many layers of fabric. Expensive, beautiful, fabric that suits him perfectly, but covered all the same.

Now all he’s wearing is a skin-tight black underarmour accentuating the lines of his body, lean but muscled.

Steve’s almost glad it’s getting too dark for him to see well, because he’s _definitely_ staring, and he has to remind himself, _This man is not human. He hurt you. Stay away from him._

He also all but asked Steve to hurt him back, afterwards.

Steve needs breathing space, away from Anthony for five damn minutes, but he knows he’s not getting it until he’s back in New York, preferably outside in full sunlight, too. Maybe he should move to California. Maybe—

He’s too out of it to make decisions now. 

In front of him, Anthony pulls something out of the side panel; then he disappears from Steve’s sight and reappears two seconds later, holding something else with a lot of wires attached. Watching him move so fast, Steve realises that wearing the armour lets him do many things—walk in the sun, for one—but it also stops him from using his full speed. And he definitely doesn’t need it for strength. He wonders what made Anthony build the suit in the first place.

An hour or two later, Anthony stands up, looking at the jet critically. “It won’t be comfortable, but it will fly,” he says.

Steve looks at it. Anthony fixed the window, which means there’s now forcefield there instead of glass, but the back of the quinjet is a mess of warped metal that doesn’t look too safe. Still, if nothing else, Steve knows he can trust Anthony’s tech expertise.

Anthony looks him up and down then. “Well, this will be fun in close quarters for a few hours,” he comments. “Strip out of that uniform and give it to Jarvis as soon as we’re back; there’s too much of your blood on it. I’ll make you a new one.”

 _Yeah, that’s not worrying at all_ , Steve thinks drily, but aloud he just says, “Jarvis?”

“Actually _has_ been my butler for years.”

So he knows, Steve understands.

Anthony walks to his armour and sighs before starting to put it on again, part after part. Finally, he’s standing with just his hand bared, like the previous night. He looks at it, then at Steve, back at his hand. “I . . .”

Sparing them both—any kind of conversation seems _off_ now—Steve nods and tosses him his own red gauntlet.

“Thank you.”

“You need to fly us, don’t you.” And they will cross into time zones where it’s sunny right now. Iron Man’s mask is as impassive as ever, but Steve gets the impression he’s said something wrong.

“Let’s go,” Anthony says, finally, and Steve follows him inside the jet.

They don’t talk at all on the flight back.

***

Steve _doesn’t_ miss Anthony, or so he tells himself when he’s sitting alone in the library, raising his eyes from his book when there’s an interesting passage he wants to share, only to find out there’s no one else there. 

_That’s how much he cares_ , he thinks, _he won’t even try to make it better_.

As if anything _could_ help, here. As if it was possible to repair a relationship as thoroughly broken as theirs. 

Except, Steve lost Anthony once already and losing him _again_ might be too much to deal with. It would’ve been better if he’d died in the ice, if he’d never learnt the truth, if he’d never gotten his heart broken.

He trains alone and he goes to gallery openings with Jan and he doesn’t dream of cold lips on his. 

A knock brings him back to the present. His eyes dart around and he notices Anthony standing near him, too quiet and too still as always. He’s leaning against the table, and Steve notices the source of the sound: a wooden object in Anthony’s left hand, held lightly between two fingers.

 _Object_. He knows perfectly well it’s a stake. If Anthony thinks giving it to Steve will make him feel safer at all, he’s deeply wrong.

“Captain,” Anthony says.

Steve doesn’t return his greeting. He’s not sure what he’d say. Certainly not _Anthony_. Even _Iron Man_ would be too nice. _Mister Stark_ , maybe. _Bloody vampire_ , more probably.

“What do you want?”

Anthony raises the stake, holding the hand away from his body. “Do you know what this is?”

“I’m not dumb,” Steve says curtly.

Anthony shakes his head. “I know that.” A brief smile, so fake it hurts. “I do hope you didn’t get all your information from dear Mister Stoker, though.”

“I called Blade,” Steve says, which is a lie, but it’s worth it to see Anthony grimace. Then he realises how it must’ve sounded, and adds, annoyed at himself, “I won’t tell anyone about you.”

“Why?” Anthony asks. “You should.”

“So you can wipe their memories, too?” Steve asks, getting up. It’s not a conversation he wants to have sitting down. 

“Because you were right,” Anthony says. He throws the stake to Steve. He catches it instinctively and then just stares at it, unsure what he’s supposed to do. It’s not just a vaguely sharpened piece of wood, he notices immediately. It feels heavy in his hand, and the surface is smooth and polished. There’s an intricate carving near the blunt part of it, as it to make it easier to handle . . . Or something else, maybe, Steve thinks as his fingers run around the markings. Anthony was holding it in the smooth part, not touching the carving. “I am a monster.”

Steve raises his eyebrows, not following.

“I killed people, Steve.”

“So did I,” Steve snaps.

Anthony has the audacity to laugh at that. “What, are you trying to tell me now that I’m a good man?” he mocks. “I’m not.”

“You’re—”

“ _I bit you_ ,” Anthony enunciates, as if Steve could ever forget. “I told you it wouldn’t happen again, but I can’t know that. Do you know the taste of your blood, Steve?” It’s a rhetorical question, but there’s something in Anthony’s face, a primal sort of longing that sends shivers running down Steve’s spine. “Bloodlust is not quite like addiction,” he continues. “I have a very intimate understanding of both. They say alcohol can consume you, but it really doesn’t compare at all.” He takes a step towards Steve, entranced. “The warmth of a human body. The frantic beating of the heart. The awareness of holding someone’s life at your fingertips. It never gets old. You never stop craving it. I can survive on blood bags, but imagine feeding on army rations for all eternity.”

Steve wants to back off, but he’s all too aware there’s a sofa just behind him.

“And _your_ blood, Steve, is the sweetest I’ve ever had.” Anthony’s eyes flash red for the briefest moment; he shakes his head, looking exasperated with himself. “I didn’t lie to you in Savage Land,” he says. “But you were hurt and I needed you to calm down and trust me long enough for me to fix the jet and get us out of there. So I didn’t tell you everything.”

“Do you ever?” Steve challenges.

“Here,” Anthony whispers. “Now.”

Steve raises his hand holding the stake and is awarded with Anthony flinching before he clearly forces himself to stay still. “What is this, Anthony?”

“A solution,” Anthony says. “The only solution.”

There’s an idea forming in Steve’s head, but he pushes it away, angrily. It can’t be right.

“I’ve lived so long.” Anthony looks away for a moment, his eyes unfocused. “I’ve seen so many things. I’ve taken so many lives. Yinsen—he told me there was a point to this existence. He told me of the good I could do with these powers. And I did! I tried! But it’s never enough, is it, and at the end of the day I still have to kill to survive.”

Everything in Steve screams that it’s _nonsense_ , but the problem is that Anthony _is_ speaking the truth now. Steve can’t find counterarguments, because there are none.

Anthony looks him in the eyes. “You’ve told me two times now, Steve, I _am_ a monster. And I really should’ve listened the first time.”

He steps even closer to Steve, so he’s in arms’ reach now, and Steve’s basically trapped between Anthony and the sofa. He _could_ jump behind it, sure, but Anthony can move so fast there’s no point in trying to escape him when he doesn’t want to let you go.

“Come on,” Anthony entreats. His fingers wrap around Steve’s right wrist and guide it, gently but firmly, until the stake’s resting against his chest; ideally over his heart. “Any wood would do, but this is aspen. I made it myself, ages ago. There’s a spell on it, too, much as I dislike magic.” A quick, bitter smile. “It won’t hurt, if you’re worried about that.”

“ _No_ ,” Steve says.

Anthony raises an eyebrow. “Have you heard a word I just said?”

“Yes, and my answer is _no_ ,” Steve repeats, staring at him. “You showed me that my life is worth living. You don’t get to do this now.”

“Oh, Steve.” Anthony is smiling now, really smiling for a change. “You’ve never needed me for that.”

“You don’t get to _use_ me like this,” Steve snaps.

Anthony’s face goes cold. “Isn’t that your duty, Captain America? Protect the people, protect the world? You know exactly how dangerous I am.” He forces Steve’s hand even closer, the stake digging into his shirt now. “Do it, then, _finish it_.”

“ _Never_.” Steve twists his hand, hard as he can; he can’t break Anthony’s grip but he can force him to let go—or break Steve’s wrist instead.

He’s looking into Anthony’s eyes, practically daring him to, and that is his mistake.

“I am sorry,” Anthony says, like the words have any meaning, and then his eyes turn red like blood, and Steve drowns in them.

He stops fighting. Anthony’s telling him to hold his hand like that, so it must be right. He wants nothing more than to please him.

There’s a sadness in Anthony’s face that Steve doesn’t quite understand, a kind of hopelessness that knows no bounds. “Eighty years ago,” he whispers, “When I first met you, I let myself believe in a happy ending. That didn’t last, of course, but that kind of hope isn’t easily buried. I found you in this century, and I thought, _if nothing else, we can be friends_. I should’ve never let myself stay close to you. I’m a creature of darkness, and you . . . You don’t deserve it.”

 _Wrong_ , Steve thinks, _wrongwrongwrong_.

“And I suppose,” Anthony continues, “it was selfish of me to ask you to do that. Please forget about our relationship, Steve. Live your life to the fullest.”

 _He can’t live without Anthony_.

But Anthony needs him to do something. Steve longs to obey him.

“I told you the last time I did this, and it’s still true. I love you. Everything would be so much easier if I didn’t.” Anthony sounds rueful. Steve’s mind, all foggy, can’t bear it.

Anthony lets his wrist go, but Steve doesn’t lower his hand. Why would he? Anthony didn’t tell him to do that.

“Kill me,” Anthony says, his voice sweet as honey and deadly as the edge of a knife.

Steve opens his eyes wide in shock and drops the stake.

***

Steve’s lying on his back in the garden, as far away from the Mansion’s walls as he can get. The library windows face the garden: it used to just mean he had a nice view, but now it’s an uncomfortable reminder. He’s gone running for hours every day since he’s last seen Anthony, though, and it’s starting to feel uncomfortably like _running away_ , so today he stayed, instead, as it really makes a difference where he is when he’s out in the sun.

There’s a closed sketchbook next to him, an excuse if anyone asks what he’s doing. The sun’s bright over him, warming his whole body; his eyes are squeezed tight against the light. He likes it. He wishes the day could last forever.

He still remembers too many things, equally mad at Anthony for making him forget in the first place and then making him remember like it’s _nothing_. The memories resurface in his mind, now, that whole terrible mess in the forest in Germany; _how_ could Steve have reacted like that? _How_ could he have reacted any other way? 

It would’ve been different if Anthony had just told him, but that doesn’t matter anymore. It’s too late for _what-ifs_. There’s just one version of reality Steve has to face, and it’s not one he enjoys at the moment.

There’s more than that one night though. Anthony’s quiet order to _remember_ brought back more than either of them suspected, and he shivers even as he knows he’s perfectly safe as he thinks one more of Anthony’s _friend_ , that other vampire who clearly meant to bite him. 

Anthony (might) have some rules he lives by. Steve’s not so sure about that other man. Not that it matters; with some luck, he’ll never see him again.

But Anthony. Steve _doesn’t_ want to keep avoiding him forever. Even after everything, he knows, he’s _better_ next to him than away. But god, he wishes Anthony would make it easier, or even just stopped making it so impossibly difficult. 

_Stop looking for excuses_ , he tells himself. _Captain America is not a coward_.

And Steve Rogers _is_ afraid, but that’s never stopped him from doing the right thing.

He’ll find Anthony today.

***

They really, really need to talk.

This is what Steve tells himself as he heads for Anthony’s workshop. He hasn’t been inside, but he knows which of the many doors in the Mansion leads to it. Steve half-expects it to be locked, really, but there’s no resistance as he turns the doorknob. He walks inside and promptly understands it’s more of a studio than a workshop like the hangar Anthony used in the war—although there _is_ a high-tech looking door at the other end of the room. But that’s not what makes him stop cold in his tracks.

Anthony is sitting in a big chair, leaning back. He’s as beautiful as ever, and Steve clearly isn’t the only person thinking so: Anthony is very much _not_ alone. There’s another man, with long blond curls, straddling his lap, his hands on Anthony’s chest, his lips dangerously close to Anthony’s neck. He turns his head when Steve enters and smiles slowly, apparently unperturbed by someone else’s presence. He certainly makes no move to get away from Anthony.

“Is this your new toy?” he asks. “Tall and blond. I’m not sure if I should be jealous or flattered, Tony.”

Steve recognises him in a sudden flash of memories. It’s the man Anthony argued with once—the man who found Steve in the forest and wiped his memories of the meeting, and Steve’s eyes widen and he has to force himself not to drop into a fighting stance immediately.

Anthony growls. “Don’t even _think_ of touching him.” He pushes the man, Tiberius, was it, off himself as he gets up; Tiberius flies a few metres back and stands up in the same moment, in fluid, quick movements Steve recognizes from Anthony.

“Interesting,” Tiberius says. “I’ve never seen you quite so possessive.”

“I’m not,” Anthony returns coldly. “He’s his own man.”

“Then what’s the problem?” Tiberius asks.

“Get out, Steve,” Anthony snaps at him.

Steve doesn’t move. He’s had it with Anthony trying to protect him and always, always hiding things. He deserves some answers, and if watching what looks dangerously like a vampire lovers’ spat is how he gets them, then so be it.

“As you said, I’m my own man.”

Tiberius just laughs. “I do like him.”

“Back _off_ , Ty.”

“Is this really how you treat an old friend?” Tiberius asks, shaking his head. 

“Friends show better manners, _darling_.” Anthony’s obviously tense, one foot braced in front of the other, ready to move at any second. Ready to _fight_.

Tiberius tilts his head suddenly. “Wait,” he says, prolonging the vowel. “You _do_ look familiar. But _of course_! Captain America. So it’s not a _new_ toy, then, Tony? That’s so unlike you.”

“We’re done here, Ty. Go away.”

“Throwing me out into the sunlight, Tony?”

Anthony runs his hand down his face. “Go to a guest room. You know the way.” And then, steel in his voice, he adds, “Do it before I _do_ throw you out in the sun.”

“Careful, Tony, that sounded almost like a threat.”

Anthony looks at him, impassive.

Tiberius’ face twists, and he pulls a dagger from under his jacket. Anthony watches him closely, prepared for an attack, but when Tiberius jumps into action, he doesn’t aim for Anthony. Steve crouches, but he doesn’t have his shield and he’s had enough experience with Anthony to know he doesn’t have a chance of dodging the attack. 

The expected pain does not come.

Anthony’s standing in front of him, bent in half and gasping in pain. With horror, Steve realises he got in the way of the dagger meant for him.

“For a _human_?” Tiberius asks, disgusted, his hand at Anthony’s shoulder. Blood dribbles down from Anthony’s mouth, and Tiberius leans in, captivated, his tongue darting out . . .

Anthony kicks him, hard, sending him flying away. He grips the hilt of the dagger, his face screwed in pain, but he doesn’t pull it out. He looks around wildly, and before Steve can say anything, he moves, faster than a human but slower than his usual terrible speed. 

Tiberius gets up, watching him with some interest in his eyes, unafraid and unharmed. He catches Anthony’s wrist easily when he attacks and Steve sees what Anthony must’ve been looking for: the stake which he’d offered to Steve.

The way to kill a vampire.

Tiberius squeezes Anthony’s arm, hard, and Anthony winces visibly, but he doesn’t drop the stake. Instead, he meets Steve’s eyes and throws it to him. Steve has to jump, but he catches it.

He doesn’t run at Tiberius: that would never work. Instead, he circles him, waiting for Tiberius to move. He’s clearly underestimating him—Steve might be a human, but he is a supersoldier too. If the vampire jumps at him, Steve will get his hit in.

And then Anthony grins, bloody, and pulls the dagger out of his stomach.

Blood splatters to the floor, and he sways on his legs; Ty catches him around the waist and stares, transfixed, his eyes red. He’s too focused on Anthony’s blood to notice Steve coming, and Steve stabs him in the back, refusing to feel guilty about it.

“What—”

And he dissolves into ashes, leaving Steve holding the stake in thin air.

 _This is what Anthony wanted him to do to himself_ , he thinks and feels sick, but he doesn’t have time to worry about _could have beens_ : Without Ty supporting him, Anthony falls to the ground.

Steve kneels next to him, near-panic: Anthony’s wincing in pain, there’s a puddle of his own blood around him, and his face is so white it seems translucent. 

“Steve.” Anthony’s voice is tight. “There are blood bags in the fridge. It’s locked, the password is—” He starts coughing, blood showing at his lips. 

Steve doesn’t hesitate. Anthony needs blood, and there is an easy solution right here. He reaches for the dagger, sees Anthony’s eyes widen, and slices through the skin of his own wrist. He puts it to Anthony’s mouth.

“ _Drink_ ,” he orders, when Anthony tries to push him away; as if his eyes didn’t go red, as if he wasn’t bleeding out in his own workshop.

A beat, and then Anthony pulls Steve’s wrist closer to his mouth, and there’s this weird feeling again, the powerlessness overcoming every cell of Steve’s body. It’s nothing like having his blood taken for medical test, and the difference doesn’t lie in the amount taken. It’s more; the feeling of his life in the grasp of another person, and the awareness he should be terrified but he isn’t.

“Enough,” Anthony gasps out. “I’ll be fine. Wrap your wrist, Steve.” He touches his stomach gingerly and winces. “I think I’ll just lie here for a while.”

Steve frowns. He pulls Anthony’s shirt up, ignoring his protest, and then _stares_. Anthony’s stomach is covered in blood, but the wound is closed. There’s a fresh scar where the dagger hit him, but that’s it. It’s like days have passed.

“Ah,” Anthony says. “I told you I heal quickly, especially with fresh blood. You don’t, so _wrap that wrist of yours_.” There’s an urgency to his voice, now, and his eyes are closed. He’s not breathing when he’s not speaking, as if he doesn’t even want to smell anything right now.

Steve considers his options briefly. He doesn’t want to leave Anthony just yet, but staying here doesn’t seem like a good idea for either of them at the moment. He hadn’t made the cut deep but it’s still bleeding, and Steve has seen what an out-of-it vampire can do to him. He’s also seen what hurting him has done to _Anthony_. 

He gets up, winces when he realises all his clothes are covered in blood—he must look a sight, really—and leaves the workshop. His hopes he won’t run into anyone only last until he goes into the main corridor: Jarvis is there. He looks at Steve, less surprised than Steve expected, and coughs. “Avengers business, Captain?”

“I think,” Steve says slowly, adjusting his opinion of the old butler, “Anthony might need your help. If that’s safe.”

“Perfectly safe.” Jarvis nods. “Thank you, Captain.” He hurries away, and Steve finally gets to his bedroom.

***

Steve’s getting ready for bed—uneasy, since he hasn’t heard from Anthony since leaving him injured in his studio the day before—when there’s a knocking at his door. He almost trips over his own legs in his rush to get to it, and then tries not to show his disappointment when it’s Jarvis outside.

“Forgive me for disturbing you, Captain, but Mister Stark would like to see you.”

“Where is he?” Steve asks immediately.

“Follow me, Captain,” Jarvis says, and Steve does, impatient. They go one floor up, to the north wing of the Mansion—exactly above Anthony’s workshop, in fact; Steve wonders if the floors are connected inside Anthony’s rooms. Jarvis leads him inside and through a parlour to another set of doors. “He’s inside.”

“Thank you, Jarvis,” Steve says, opening the door and stepping through.

He finds himself in Anthony’s bedroom. Surprisingly, it’s not completely dark, there are lights turned on—though Anthony had sent for him, so that might explain it. The room is spacious, the curtains over the windows carefully drawn. There’s a large canopy bed at the opposite wall. Anthony’s sitting in it, propped up with several pillows. He looks pale, but that’s not unusual. Steve slowly walks to him. 

“Thanks,” Anthony says.

Steve squints. “Is what I was about to say. You saved my life.”

“After putting you in danger in the first place.” He frowns. “And also after almost killing you myself. I don’t quite understand why you helped me.”

“Do you really want to argue about that, now?” Steve asks.

Anthony raises an eyebrow. “I wasn’t aware we were arguing.”

Steve shakes his head and sits at the edge of Anthony’s bed. “How’re you feeling?”

“Pretty well, considering.” Anthony looks at his hands and Steve follows his line of sight to find Anthony’s left palm is bandaged.

“What happened there?”

Anthony smiles, self-deprecating. “That stake isn’t meant to be used by vampires.”

Steve remembers the decorative carvings along the handle and the careful way Anthony didn’t touch them, back in the library. Clearly, they’re not so decorative after all.

“You said you’d made it,” Steve recollects.

“Weapons are something of my speciality.” Anthony shrugs and immediately winces. “Take Ty’s dagger,” he adds in a bitter voice. “Really, I’m very good at creating things that end up threatening people I care about.”

“Ah.” Steve looks away.

“Steve. I meant you, not Ty.” Anthony almost seems amused.

“Who was he?” Steve finally asks, unable to stop himself.

Anthony doesn’t look surprised at the question.

“He had been my friend, at some point.” He gazes into space. “At the very least, he was one of the people I’ve known the longest. Since the beginning, in fact. That always means something, and more so after a few centuries.” He looks at Steve and sighs. “He was dangerous and he wasn’t a good man. He would’ve killed you, just to get at me. So I don’t—I don’t regret he’s gone.” But he does look guilty. It’s an emotion Steve’s quickly learning to identify on Anthony’s face.

“I’ve met him before,” Steve admits.

Anthony raises an eyebrow. “Very briefly.”

“No.” Steve shakes his head. “I ran into him during a night patrol. I think he wanted to bite me, but he heard you coming and he made me forget.”

Anthony narrows his eyes. “If I’d known . . .”

“Don’t,” Steve interjects. There’s something gratifying in Anthony getting all, well, vengeful on his behalf, but there’s no need for it anymore. At least the completely unwarranted guilt is gone from his expression.

“Steve.” There’s something in Anthony’s voice that makes Steve sit up straight. “You can’t possibly be okay with me.”

“I told you I didn’t want to argue,” Steve says, trying to keep his tone light.

“I hurt you worse than Ty did,” Anthony says.

“True,” Steve agrees: it is painful, and it is the truth.

“So why are you here? You can’t possibly enjoy my company.” There’s quiet resignation in Anthony’s eyes, a calm certainty Steve’s only there to say goodbye.

“Can’t I?” Steve asks, deceptively at ease when in reality he wants to scream. “Are we back to you hypnotizing me to tell me what to do, or?”

Anthony covers his face with one hand. “You called me a monster.”

“And you immediately wiped my mind. I’d call us even.” Steve tries to regulate his breathing. “It’s the _lying about being dead_ thing that gets to me.” He knows his voice is shaking and he hates it, but he can’t help it. He wants to shake Anthony and make him _understand_ , but he keeps his hands at his sides: the man is hurt already.

“Steve. I’d already known your reaction to my nature.”

“And that makes it okay?!” Steve gets up and paces around the room, unable to sit still.

“I didn’t say that.” Anthony sighs. He reaches to his right, and only then does Steve notice a small bedside table, and a glass of something red atop it. Anthony’s eyes briefly glow red as he drinks. If he expects to scare Steve off, he’s got another thing coming. “But I lost you too, Steve, for almost eighty years. Call me selfish, but I didn’t want to lose you again immediately after getting you back.”

This makes Steve stop in his tracks. It took losing Anthony for Steve to be able to deal with what he is, if that means Anthony’s near him. He can’t honestly say his reaction would’ve been any different than before if Anthony had told him the truth immediately. 

But Anthony still lied.

“That’s not all,” Anthony admits after a moment. 

Steve’s ready to scream at the announcement, but then Anthony pushes his covers away and gets up. His face screws up in pain for a moment before he schools his features, but he slowly moves to stand opposite Steve, clad in black pyjamas that seem to flow around him. His shoulders are tense. Steve wonders just how badly silver can harm a vampire: he’d seen the wound close almost immediately, but Anthony’s very clearly not anywhere near healed yet. Is that normal? Or is it because he _kept fighting_ with a silver dagger plunged into his stomach?

He opens his mouth to tell Anthony to lie back down and stop pushing himself for no reason, but before he can speak, Anthony looks at him with an unreadable expression, and then he pulls his shirt off.

Steve stares.

His midsection is bandaged where Tiberius stabbed him, but that’s not what catches Steve’s attention. Anthony’s chest is covered with a mess of scars, visible against his white skin. They’re on the left side: right over his heart.

“This is the only scar I have,” Anthony says. “Or will ever have, really.”

“What happened?”

“You could say I did it to myself.” He pauses. “I built some bombs. They killed a lot of people, and in the end, they almost killed me, too. You see, you _can_ scar a vampire if you remove their heart first. I _should’ve_ died. I would say it’s a miracle that I didn’t, but the only miracle was that there was a good, selfless man with me. His name was Yinsen. And he saved me.” He puts his shirt back on. Steve thinks it’s more about hiding his face for a moment than really being self-conscious about the scars. Once dressed, Anthony keeps talking. “It was years ago.” But his voice is tight and his face is clouded by guilt. The memories are clearly as fresh as ever. “And I’m telling you this, because you need to understand, I’m not human.”

 _Remove his heart_? Steve shakes his head. “You’re—”

“I’m very nearly immortal,” Anthony speaks over him without ever raising his voice. “It’s difficult to harm me. You can kill me with a stake immediately. You can hurt me with silver, and without blood, I will die. You can open the windows during the daytime, and I will burn, just like with fire. But any other injury will heal immediately. I’m dead already: I don’t have a pulse, and I don’t need to breathe. And I will never grow old.”

Steve’s known all of that already, if not listed in such a detached manner. He makes a questioning gesture. “And—”

“ _And you will_.”

Oh.

 _Oh_.

“You’re scared,” Steve realises.

Anthony doesn’t even try to deny it.

And Steve snaps.

“If keeping me at arm’s length was the only solution you saw, then you should’ve thought of that back in the forties!”

Anthony shuffles back to sit at the edge of his bed. “I know,” he says, facing away. “I’m sorry.”

“And—and you tried to make me kill you—and make me forget you, too, because—” He stumbles over the words, unable to express how _wrong_ it all was. “Is that what _you_ want? To forget me?”

Anthony’s eyes widen, horrified. “ _Never_.”

“Then _why_?”

“You remember everything I said, don’t you.” Anthony looks down. “You really do deserve better.”

“Maybe I don’t _want_ better,” Steve says. “Maybe I just want to be able to _choose_.”

Anthony tilts his head. “Then _what_ do you want?”

Steve slumps. The truth of it is: he doesn’t know. Anthony’s been trying to make this choice for him, and Steve’s never been even allowed to consider what he wants. And he’d been so focused on everything that’s gone wrong that he doesn’t know how to go forward, _where_ to go to. But he knows one thing; the one certainty that he’s clung to since Savage Land.

“I don’t want to lose you,” he lets out. “I don’t know what I want. But whatever it is, I want to do it _with you_.”

Anthony stares at him, and even as Steve remembers his quiet, desperate words, _I love you_ , he prepares himself for a rejection.

“I think,” Anthony says, very, very slowly, “I can promise you that.”

Steve sags with relief. He sits next to Anthony and wraps his arms around him and forces himself to suppress a flinch. The coldness of his skin reminds Steve a bit too sharply of the ice, but it’s enough to remember it’s _Anthony_ and he meant—and still means— _home_ to make the memory go away.

If they both want to go forward, _they can_.

***

Steve’s chewing some truly delicious beef, courtesy of Jarvis, when Anthony walks into the dining room. 

“Jan. Steve.” He doesn’t sit at the table. He’s no longer wearing pyjamas, instead dressed in what Steve personally considers _way too distracting_ tight trousers and an embroidered black shirt with wide sleeves, narrowing at his wrists. The only colourful piece he’s wearing is a red cravat at his neck. Steve stares at it, an idea half-forming in his mind; he saves it for later.

Jan looks at him quizzically. “Tony,” she says. “This _is_ a nice surprise.”

Anthony smiles, and Steve realises that he never shows his teeth when talking to other people. “You might’ve seen me more often than you thought.” He sounds like Tony Stark from New York again.

Jan raises an eyebrow. “Do continue.”

Anthony sighs. He looks over at Steve and Steve nods at him, even though he really doesn’t think Anthony needs emotional support here.

“I’m Iron Man.”

Jan laughs, delighted. “I knew it!”

Anthony’s eyes widen. “You what?!”

Steve has to admit seeing him shocked is actually brilliant.

“Oh come on, Tony.” Jan waves a hand. “No one could close themselves in their workshop forever and not go mad. And you’re way too charming for a self-declared hermit.” She winks at him.

Anthony chuckles. “I’ll take that as a compliment.”

Jan nods, and then glances at Steve. “And you’re not surprised either.” She frowns. “He told you first!”

“ _Told_ is one way to put it,” Steve mutters, staring into his plate.

“I could’ve handled that better,” Anthony says in what must be the understatement of the century. 

Jan must’ve picked up on the sudden tension, because she doesn’t prod. “So you’ll be joining us for meals now? I’ve always felt sorry for you unable to eat in that armour.”

Anthony shakes his head.

 _Will you tell the others_ , Steve had asked, and Anthony had just smiled, _Not all_. The way he’s looking, it seems more like he wanted to announce that he’s a vampire than that he’s Iron Man, but clearly that’s the part he’s keeping to himself.

“I guess there is a reason you’re hiding in the suit,” Jan mutters. “Okay.”

“Okay?” Anthony repeats.

“You’re forgiven, and your secret is safe with me, of course.”

Anthony gives her a bow. “Thank you.”

Jan points her finger at him. “But you’re _not_ forgiven for not wearing my clothes right now.”

“I save those for the public appearances,” Anthony says. “Where everyone can appreciate your design.”

“Ah, once in a decade,” she tells him, but she’s laughing already. 

Steve laughs too, because he’s with his family, and he’s home.

***

Steve dithers just outside Anthony’s room. Sure, Anthony told him to come any time, but this is his space. And yes, it’s the best place for what Steve wants to ask him, but he shouldn’t bother Anthony when he’s resting. Sure, he looked okay at dinner yesterday, but still. Steve turns away and then the door opens.

“You do realise I _can_ hear you.” Anthony laughs warmly.

Steve turns back and glares at him. “You couldn’t have come out earlier?”

“I hoped you would just come in. I did invite you.”

Steve frowns at his choice of words. “Wait, is that true? You need invitation?”

Anthony glances heavenwards. “I’m afraid so.”

“I guess it doesn’t matter since I live in your house, but for the record, I would invite you in, too,” Steve tells him and is rewarded with Anthony’s rare real smile. Even the fangs showing don’t scare Steve anymore.

“You probably shouldn’t,” Anthony chides, but he doesn’t stop smiling. He lets Steve pass him to go inside and closes the door behind them. 

“I, ahh,” Steve fumbles. “I know you’re just getting up now, but I couldn’t sleep, and I wondered—”

“You can sleep here,” Anthony says, looking at him with concern. “And I can put you to sleep, without any dreams.”

Steve shakes his head. “Thanks, but no.”

Anthony doesn’t insist. He leads Steve to his bed and they sit on it, close together but not touching. “Do you need anything?”

“I’m fine,” Steve says. “I’m with you.”

“I still can’t believe this is real,” Anthony says in wonder. “I keep thinking you’ll see sense and leave.”

“After everything,” Steve says, gesturing between them, “I really think I do know what I’m getting myself into.”

Anthony chuckles. “See, the issue is, this _everything_ really should’ve sent you running as far away from me as you can get.”

“I’ve always been stubborn,” Steve counters. He links his fingers with Anthony’s and doesn’t even mind the chill clinging to Anthony’s skin. He’s never known him to be warm, and so the cold is familiar, not enough to put out the fire inside Steve.

“And I’m very happy for that.” Anthony raises their linked hands to his lips and presses a kiss to Steve’s palm. “But I wish I could promise I’d always keep you safe.”

Steve makes a face. “I can take care of myself.”

“I know.” Anthony smiles. “Part of why I love you so much.”

Steve gives him a look. He’s still holding Anthony’s hand and he doesn’t let go, but there’s a brief surge of annoyance. “Wow,” he says. “It doesn’t feel like I’m being hypnotized. Maybe I’m getting used to the feeling. Are your next words ‘ _forget me_ ’?”

Anthony sighs. “I deserved that,” he says.

“Glad we’re on the same page, then,” Steve says. “I love you too.”

Anthony’s eyes widen, as if he still didn’t expect Steve to feel that way or to admit it. “I . . .” He clears his throat, then shakes his head, and just brings Steve in for a kiss. 

The kiss is long and slow. Steve leans into Anthony with a soft exhale. He runs his tongue over Anthony’s lips, and then over his teeth, the upper row, first incisors and then—

“You _really_ shouldn’t do that,” Anthony tells him, pushing him away and keeping him at arm’s length with a steel grip on Steve’s shoulder.

“Maybe I want you to bite me,” Steve challenges.

“You’ve _no idea_ what you’re talking about.” Anthony’s eyes grow colder, the lines of his face annoyed. 

“You say that like you don’t want to,” Steve argues.

“What is wrong with you?” Anthony demands. “I could kill you.”

“How’s that new?” Steve doesn’t back off. He’s thought about it enough. “I trust you, Anthony. I know you won’t hurt me.”

Anthony laughs.

“You didn’t hurt me when you lost control of yourself, I doubt—”

“Your definition of _not being hurt_ is questionable,” Anthony snaps.

Steve shakes his head. “And after that, _you_ were hurt, and bleeding, and you still pushed me away before you took too much of my blood.”

“That’s basic etiquette,” Anthony drawls. “ _Don’t kill the person currently saving your life_.”

Steve snorts. “I’m sure Ty would agree.”

That was a bad idea: Anthony goes very still at the mention of the name. 

“I’m sorry,” Steve says after a pause. “That was a low blow.”

“No, you’re right.” Anthony hugs his arms to himself. Steve moves closer to him, ready for Anthony to shake his head and tell him to stay away, but Anthony doesn’t. He leans into Steve’s body and relaxes.

“I’m not really bothered by any sort of temperatures,” he says after a moment, “but I have to admit it is nice how warm you are. How alive.”

“You’re welcome to snuggle any time.”

“Mm. As long as you’re letting go of that stupid idea.”

Steve shakes his head, and then keeps his arm firmly around Anthony when he moves back. “No, listen to me.”

“I am listening, Steve, and you keep not making any sense.” But he stays pressed into Steve’s side.

“You bit me when neither of us wanted it. I gave you blood when you were dying.” Steve can feel the tension in Anthony’s body. “I want you to bite me when it’s my own choice. Because I love you, and because I don’t want you to be afraid of hurting me for the rest of my life.”

“I want it too much,” Anthony admits.

“But you want me to be all right more than that,” Steve says. “Please.”

Anthony nods minutely; Steve only notices because they’re sitting so close. “Okay,” he says.

“Okay?” Steve repeats.

Anthony leans back just far enough to be able to look Steve in the eyes. “Yes,” he says. “I’m well-rested. You’re well-rested. We’re at home, safe as we can be. And I _know_ you’ll keep insisting no matter what I say, so.” He sighs, and adds, in a quieter voice, “And I _really_ want to. Which should make you change your mind immediately.”

“Do it,” Steve says instead.

Anthony kisses him, just a touch of his lips to Steve’s. He sits with his knees spread and pulls Steve in so he’s between his legs, his right side leaning against Anthony’s chest. He presses his lips to Steve’s neck and just stays like that for a moment, inhaling and exhaling. Steve leans his forehead against Anthony’s encircling arm and waits.

Anthony licks at his neck a bit, a cold and wet touch that somehow manages not to be unpleasant. The bite comes almost as an afterthought, two sharp points of pain that soon smooths out. Steve goes limp in his arms. It’s different from the previous times. He still feels like he can’t move, but he doesn’t even think he should be afraid. He knows he’s safe here. His whole body bursts with his love for Anthony.

He feels timeless, too, but he knows it hasn’t been long when Anthony moves away. He straightens up and looks down at Steve, his lips as red as his eyes. “Are you—”

“You didn’t hurt me,” Steve says. “You never will.”

Anthony smiles like a man who’s learnt _never_ doesn’t mean much when you live long enough, but he doesn’t contradict Steve.

“ _Thank you_ ,” he says.

He lies back, pulling Steve down on top of himself, wraps his arms around Steve’s waist and clasps his hands behind his back. 

“Afraid I’ll run off?” Steve jokes.

“No,” Anthony says, his voice coloured with awe. “Somehow I know you won’t.”

 _Finally_ , Steve thinks but doesn’t say. He rests his head on Anthony’s unmoving chest and closes his eyes.

He’ll share what part of Anthony’s eternity he can.

**Author's Note:**

> There are tumblr posts for the arts and fic too, if you want to like or reblog them!  
> \- [a tumblr teaser](http://massivespacewren.tumblr.com/post/179728743413/heres-part-of-the-art-for-my-cap-im-big-bang-i) for the art by MassiveSpaceWren  
> \- full art by Faite [is here](http://hellogarbagetime.tumblr.com/post/179729414634/hereafter-by-laireshi-steve-rogers-and-anthony)  
> \- [the fic post](https://laireshi.tumblr.com/post/179729993792/cap-im-bb-hereafter)

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Art for "Hereafter"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16509680) by [MassiveSpaceWren](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MassiveSpaceWren/pseuds/MassiveSpaceWren)




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